


Domestics

by LizzyLovegood



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Fluff without Plot, Friendship, Marriage, Romance, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-01-06
Updated: 2016-04-09
Packaged: 2018-03-06 10:55:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 62,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3131903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LizzyLovegood/pseuds/LizzyLovegood
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When they're not saving the universe, the Doctor and Rose are just like any other couple. Well . . . almost. Snippets of the life of the Doctor in the TARDIS with Rose Tyler.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Mornings

**Author's Note:**

> As you may have guessed from the summary, these are unrelated one shots about the Doctor and Rose. There is a bit of a plot if you squint but not much more than that. It's mostly just pure fluff with a bit of angst thrown in now and again. Careful how much you ingest at once.
> 
> There are currently 22 chapters of this on FF.net. I will be posting one or two a day until they're all uploaded here. The rating will increase as the "story" progresses.

The Doctor doesn't need much sleep. He may choose to – lying in bed, eyes closed, for a few hours is a pleasant way to pass the early hours of the morning. Rose swears he snores, he swears Time Lords do _not_ snore (their superior biology does not allow them to) but he can't tell if she's joking. Besides, tinkering with the TARDIS in the early hours of the morning just as pleasant – if not more so, since it afforded Rose a decent night's sleep.

How humans – his pink-and-yellow one included – can possibly need so much sleep is beyond him. The Doctor has to forcibly stop himself numerous times from waking Rose up – at 3:00 AM, at 3:02 AM. . . . It gets boring amassing all the knowledge the universe has to offer when there is no one to share it with _right that very second_. He knows from experience though, that even if he may find the mating habits of the Sycorax absolutely riveting, Rose _does not care at 4:30 in the morning, Doctor_!

Therefore, he waits until a semi-reasonable time – 7:06 AM – before bounding into her room, excited as a puppy with gorgeous (if he does say so himself) big brown eyes to match.

"Time to start the day, Rose Tyler!" he crows, bouncing up and down on the pink bedspread. Rose groans and buries her head in the pillow, grumbling about inconsiderate Time Lords and has he ever heard of a thing called _beauty sleep_.

The Doctor is quite used to such grumblings.

"You're beautiful enough," he reminds her. "Now – up, up!" He lifts the coverlet to expose her bare feet and she opens eyes still fuzzy with sleep to glare at him.

He only beams, step one on his mental checklist complete.

Step two – breakfast – is a bit more difficult. The TARDIS is constantly switching things around on him and in the fifteen minutes it takes Rose to stumble into the kitchen – hair a mess, still in her pink pajamas – he has only managed to unearth a potato masher and a chestnut-roasting pan. Where did they pick _that_ up?

She only laughs at his befuddled expression, one which quickly changes to outrage as she reaches into a cupboard and pulls out a griddle. Rose selects the ingredients for banana pancakes with ease and he growls, muttering idle threats to the TARDIS under his breath.

Rose tells him _she must know who the domestic one is_.

The Doctor shakes a finger at her and ties an apron around his waist. "I'll show you domestic, Rose Tyler." He sets to chopping the bananas with relish while Rose adds the milk, eggs, and flour – what she would call more vital ingredients but what is more vital than bananas? – to a large mixing bowl.

Pouring the malleable batter onto the hot griddle, the Doctor uses his sonic to manipulate it into ridiculously intricate shapes before plopping the banana slices in, one by one. He slides several piping-hot Daleks onto a plate Rose hands him before starting on the next batch – Cybermen this time.

 _You know, most people just make hearts and smiley faces._ Rose laughs and pops a piece of Dalek into her mouth.

The Doctor gives her a hard look – and then winks. "I don't do anything by halves, Rose Tyler."

But he makes hearts anyway – three of them – with the intensity one would reserve for surgery on that same organ. One comes out slightly wonky which, he holds firmly, are the way Time Lord hearts are _supposed_ to look.

"None of that Valentine's Day nonsense for us," he tells her. "Do you know, I've never understood that holiday. What is it, a competition between gents for who can buy their wife more stuff? Or between women, for who gets the most? You know, once. . . ."

Amidst his rambling, Rose sets their plates on the table and he joins her. They drown the pancakes in syrup – the Doctor chops up another couple of bananas to put on top – and eat their way steadily through the pile. The Doctor knows there will be no running today.

Instead there is talking. Talking about planets they've been to – dangerous and non – and planets they plan to go to – dangerous and non. Talking about going to visit Jackie – _she'd love to see you_ / _she'd love to_ slap _me; a sadist your mother is_. Talking about Captain Jack's luck rebuilding the universe (the Doctor) and whether he might be interested in some dancing (Rose despite the Doctor's protestations).

_I didn't mean me, Doctor! After all, you're the slim, foxy one, aren'tcha?_

" _And_ rude and not ginger! I think that might turn him off a bit."

 _Doctor, I have never seen Jack turned_ off _in my life._

They talk about they will do (visit planets and save alien races), what they might do (visit Jackie. The Doctor accepts this as fact, he can never say no to Rose), who they will never, under any circumstances, do (Jack).

They talk instead of do and that's fine with the Doctor. Because right now he has Rose and he has banana pancakes and he is happy.


	2. Afternoons

Rose swivels in the console chair, legs swinging as she flips idly through _Cosmo_ or _People_ or _Us_ _Weekly_. The Doctor fiddles with the TARDIS but looks over now and then to scoff at the blaring headlines.

_It’s always the same – someone getting married or divorced and then cheating on the person they married with the person they divorced._

But Rose needs to see that sometimes. She needs that sameness. The vastness of the whole universe – a universe she can travel around in with no more than the flick of a switch – overwhelms her a bit. When she sees a magazine from back home or from a planet billions of light-years from Earth, both filled with the same sort of rubbish – as the Doctor calls it – it makes the whole thing feel a whole lot smaller.

The Doctor, who seems to have a preternatural sense for when she is brooding – _takes one to know one_ – stands and crosses the few feet between them. He places his hands on her shoulders, anchoring her, and leans down to read the article she is currently immersed in. His glasses – she is sure they aren't necessary, they're just to show off – slip to the end of his nose and he pushes them back up again.

It’s always something, “What Men Really Want In Bed” – _you_ minx _, Rose Tyler_ – or “First Date Horror Stories” – _blimey, you humans really are terrible at this dating thing, aren’t you?_

To which Rose reminds him that _their_ first date involved saving the planet from being taken over by Autons.

_Yes, but at least I took you to get chips after, the Doctor points out._ This _one didn’t even do that._

He doesn’t deny it was a date, not when they’re like this with his arms around her and his face buried in her hair and his breath sending chills down her spine.

It is so easy, so effortless, no grand romantic gesture. It is not like the day – so much like this day, these types of days tend to blend together – that the Doctor turns on the radio and invites her to dance.

_I know the old me could cut a rug. Let’s see about this body._ And he offers Rose his hand.

The song is a lively one, some nineteen-fifties swing, and he twirls her and dips her until she gets dizzy and collapses against him, both of them laughing like madmen. Then the song changes. It is a softer, slower tune now; a man croons about – what else? – a woman he loved and lost.

“Shall we dance?” Rose asks, her voice coming out huskier than she means it to. Rose looks up at him and sees him gazing right back at her; it is one of those looks he gives her when he thinks she doesn’t see, one of those looks that says everything. Her hands clench in his pinstripes and for a moment, just a moment, he holds her tighter, too – as if he never wants to let go.

Then the moment is over; he, quite literally, pushes her away. He mutters something inaudible, goes to shut off the radio. The singer's crooning is abruptly cut off and now it is only the Doctor's voice, filled with over-exuberance, that echoes falsely through the room. He asks _d_ _o you want to go somewhere for chips or I saw this great bazaar over on Klom a few years ago, let me show you_. And she agrees to something – whatever it is – and he off spinning levers and dials.

They both act like this is normal, that this is precisely what they want.

Rose wonders how long she can keep pretending.

Because in moments like this, moments with no sweet nothings or crooning words. . . . His arms are firmly around her now (she is sure he would squeeze himself into the chair with her if he could and he reads the alleged horror stories with the _gravitas_ reserved for high drama. Rose laughs and snatches the glasses from his face, tries them on for size.

“Well, Doctor, how do I look?”

He pretends to fumble blindly, muttering that he can't see a thing without them and _how can she be so cruel_ , reaches down to tickle her ribs instead.

In moments like this, it is impossible to deny that they are what they pretend so hard they aren't.


	3. Evenings

The Doctor likes to do everything quickly. He runs fast, he makes plans fast, he talks fast (Rose calls it babbling). Not only is it a necessity to avoid being murdered and/or mutilated by alien hordes but it drives him mad to think of all the knowledge and danger and running the universe has to offer if only he could get there just a bit _quicker_.

Therefore, he cannot stand it when Rose insists on making dinner the human way and _no sonic, Doctor!_ Everything gets done so _slooowly_. The water boils slowly, the vegetables are chopped even more slowly, the chicken is cooked more slowly still. The Doctor has seen the cookbooks Rose keeps in a pile on the counter, has seen Rose and Jackie’s annotations in the margins (Rose: _add more egg_ , Jackie: _brandy gives better taste_ ). He knows that Rose gets homesick sometimes – after their trip to that parallel universe, they spent a month back at the flat – and that making the roast chicken and the pork dumplings and the apple crisp make her feel just that bit closer. He knows it makes her happy (and anything that makes Rose happy makes him happy) but . . . well, he’s _hungry_.

Rose notices him sulking and relegates him to chopping vegetables for the salad – _the manual way, Doctor_ , even when he musters his best puppy-dog expression – and he sighs melodramatically but sets to it with verve nonetheless. He chops the romaine and the tomatoes and the onions as if he were born for precisely that purpose and dumps them all into a large bowl. Rose, who is putting the chicken in the oven, smiles at him and he beams back.

She sets the timer for a half-hour and his smile loses its’ luster. Not to mention, his stomach growls – rather loudly.

“You know. . . .”

She cuts him off with a decisive _No, Doctor._ She has gotten far too good at reading him.

“But Rose, I could cook that bird to perfection in two minutes! Like that first Thanksgiving we went to? The Pilgrims loved me! We won’t even have to worry about it burning again – remember last time?”

Which is just about when everything goes to hell.

In retrospect, the Doctor muses, it was a bit of a bad move on his part to bring up _last time_ seeing as it had been sort of, partially, really _all_ his fault (he had tried to maximize the oven’s efficiency and had neglected to tell her that said oven may . . . well, _blow up_ on occasion). But she hadn’t really needed to say that he used his stupid sonic for everything, had she? It most certainly was not stupid and he had told her (another mistake) that he certainly hadn’t heard her complaining all the times it had saved her life when he expressly ordered her not to wander off.

Things had just gotten so much worse from there, each of them lobbing insults and long-forgiven (but apparently not forgotten) grievances at the other. At one point the oven timer – that long-forgotten catalyst – had gone off but both had ignored it. The Doctor had thought it would never end – he and Rose hardly ever fought (and never over something so trivial) and he wasn’t really sure what to expect. But, at long last, Rose had stormed off, shouting about arrogant Time Lords and going to visit her mum, and he had said _fine_ and she had said _fine_ right back.

Now, all of five minutes later, the Doctor sits at the kitchen table, head in his hands and feeling really, _really_ bad. He was sorry four minutes and thirty seconds ago (four minutes and thirty-one seconds now) and wants more than anything to go to her, wrap her up in a tight hug, and apologize (even if it isn't strictly _all_ his fault, his screwdriver is not stupid) but is terrified of what he might find – a still-angry Rose or a suitcase packed for a nice, long stay at her mother’s.

Worse still, a room cleared of everything that makes it so uniquely _Rose_ – the pink bedspread stripped and the bathroom vanity emptied of all that goop she loves to smear on her skin. Suppose she is planning on leaving for good?

The thought is too horrible to even consider. Without Rose, who will there be to get into danger (and escape) with, to laugh with, to curl up on the couch and watch cheesy movies with? Without Rose, whose hand will he have to hold?

He already misses it. Misses _her_.

The Doctor places his sonic down on the table and goes to the cupboard. The TARDIS, sensing his distress, nudges him toward the proper ingredients. Within minutes he is (manually) blending together the flour and the milk, the eggs and the chocolate. His stomach rumbles warningly but he ignores it; now is not the time to indulge his own selfish whims. He studies the mixture closely for a moment before adding a handful of chocolate-chips. Pink chocolate-chips. Rose's favorite.

Pouring the batter into a rectangular pan, he goes to take the chicken (burned to a fine crisp by now) out of the oven and tips the charred bird into the trash. It is only when he returns to the uncooked batter that he feels a pair of slim arms slip around his waist. She stands on tiptoe, burying her head in the crook of his neck, blonde hair tickling the exposed skin.

Breathing a deep sigh of relief, the Doctor turns to envelop her fully in his arms. He hopes she can't feel him shaking as he squeezes her, beaming broadly against her shoulder. It feels like a reunion after months of separation rather than a mere fifteen minutes.

When they finally pull apart, she ducks around him to pick up the pan of (as yet uncooked) brownies. She peeks up at him somewhat shyly and smiles, tongue between her teeth.

_I wasn't really in the mood for chicken anyway._ Because it's easier than saying _I'm sorry._

“They're pink,” the Doctor points out. Because it's easier than saying _Rassilon, Rose, you have nothing to be sorry for._ I'm _sorry, I'm so, so sorry. Just don't leave, please don't leave, Rose – without you, I am nothing._ And he prays she understands.

_We should add bananas, make them pink-and-yellow._ She laughs and the Doctor knows that she knows.

Keen to please, the Doctor pulls his stock of banana chips from the cupboard (again, the TARDIS all but throws them into his hand), sprinkles them liberally into the batter – “Rose Tyler Brownies, oh, aren't they a _beauty_!” - and places the pan in the oven. Rose shuts the door and sets the timer for a half-hour.

The Doctor doesn't protest.

There is no argument to accompany the timer this time; there is a serving knife and two plates and a hungry Doctor and his companion. There is a couch to curl up on – the Doctor and Rose with barely any room to squeeze the pan of Rose Tyler Brownies (which the Doctor insists on calling them) in between – and a film to watch and, as the credits roll, a last brownie to split.

There is the slow path to take.

And the Doctor doesn't mind at all.


	4. Nightmares

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one includes some Nine/Rose sweetness for you Nine fans. He was my first Doctor and will always have a special place in my heart. :)

Rose wakes, gasping for air, and finds the Doctor beside her. He wastes no time on formalities – no exuberant greeting or answer as to why he is in her bed at three-thirty in the morning (she already knows, it has become habit with them) is forthcoming – simply pulls her into his arms. Rose allows herself to relax into him, fingers clutching at the TARDIS-blue flannel of his pajamas. Silent tears roll down her cheeks, soaking his shirt, and he holds her all the tighter, murmuring hollow reassurances into her ear.

_It’s alright, Rose. I’m here, I’ve got you. You’re safe, it’s not real. I’ve got you._

When they both knew that it was very, very real.

Long gone are the days when her night terrors involved being late for work, giant spiders, or – on the worst nights – meeting Jimmy Stone down a dark alley. All the foolish, unfounded fears of a nineteen-year-old shop girl who had experienced nothing of the world. And, as wondrous as this world – this whole _universe_ – is, it is equally as horrifying.

Now she sees her mum and Mickey cornered by Slitheen, she sees the clockwork droids strap down herself and Mickey, ready to cut them open, she sees the empty children or the crimson-eyed Ood or the Daleks converge on her and the Doctor. And, although she has been through all this before, though she knows what the ending is supposed to be, Rose finds that she cannot move an inch, cannot say a word, cannot do _anything_. She is forced to watch her family and friends slaughtered and it is only when they turn to start on her that she wakes, screams that she could not utter trapped in her throat.

Rose doesn't remember when the nightmares first started – on a time machine, it is difficult to pinpoint the exact date for anything – but is startled awake late one night (or early one morning), shaking with barely suppressed sobs, and finding a leather jacket draped over her shoulders. She clutches the jacket to her chest, a child with a security blanket, breathing in the scent. _His_ scent.

When she finally does drift off again, her sleep is peaceful and uninterrupted and when she wakes in the morning – 9:30 AM, she is surprised the Doctor let her sleep in this long – the jacket is gone.

The Doctor is unusually solicitous toward her after nights like this – and there are other nights, during which the jacket always reappears – asking what she wants for breakfast or where she wants to go. There are no sarcastic quips about _stupid apes_ until at least noon and he snaps at Jack if the captain makes even the barest suggestion of a lewd remark (though the latter may be for his own personal enjoyment). Rose knows it is his way of apologizing for not being there himself, for offering up only the most superficial layer of himself – the rough-and-tough mask he dons to face the world – and hoping that it is enough.

Of course Rose doesn't expect him to stay. She’s a grown woman and he’s certainly not her mother, who would always brew her up a hot cuppa after a nightmare (usually of the giant spider variety).

But one night he does. One night her eyes pop open and the Doctor’s blue eyes and big ears are the first thing she sees.

He doesn’t say anything at first; looks, in fact, to be battling two primal urges – to run away and pretend this never happened or to wrap her in his arms until the shaking has subsided. By now they have, hesitantly, begun the tradition of post-adventure hugs and the strength of his grip in those few, quick seconds surprises her.

The Doctor sighs, appears to compromise with himself and, planting himself on the edge of the bed, throws an arm over her shuddering shoulders.

_They go away eventually._ It is poor comfort but she knows it is the only kind he will offer.

“When?”

_I don’t know._ He gives her a slightly twisted smile. He is still dressed in his trademark jumper and dark trousers – the leather jacket is on the bed next to her. Rose wonders if he sleeps at all but doesn't dare ask; even knowing certain personal things about him – that he loves Harry Potter and has a bit of an obsession with bananas – he still intimidates her at times.

In return, he doesn't ask what her dream was about. They discuss everything but – the newest alien soap that Rose is partial toward and the Doctor mocks, the chip shop in Cardiff, Jack's newest sexual conquests – and, when the Doctor departs (he never stays until she falls asleep and she never asks him to), it is with Rose in a far calmer state than when he arrived. Rose finds that, though she dreads the nightmares, she looks forward to these late-night conversations. They never touch other than the occasional shoulder squeeze and their discussion, barring Jack's _dancing_ , never slips into the realm of double entendres and innuendos. Still, there is something oddly intimate about it all – whispering in the darkness, the hum of the TARDIS the only sound; being careful not to wake Jack, afraid of sharing this moment with him.

The new Doctor (or _new-new Doctor_ as he calls himself) – so much more peppy, so much more, well . . . _sexy_ – increases that feeling tenfold. One night, not long before the end of the Christmas holidays, she gasps herself awake – this time it was her mother, face devoid of emotion, jumping off the roof of the flat, compelled by the Sycorax – only to feel a pair of strong arms wrap around her. She opens her mouth to scream before she recognizes his face.

_Shh, it's just me._

“Doctor?”

_Hello._ He breathes the word against her hair and she can hear the smile in his voice before he pulls back to view her face. Gently, he swipes a few stray tear tracks away with the pad of his thumb. Rose leans into his touch.

He lets her.

He is so much softer, and so much fiercer, than she ever imagined the Doctor could be. The way he holds her, the way she catches him looking at her sometimes – as if he is afraid she will disappear if he looks away or loosens his grip, even for a moment. The rough-and-tough man may wear a handsome mask but there is no disguising it utterly.

_What was it?_ he asks now when the tears have subsided and her grip on his shirt has slackened. _Rose, tell me._

She shakes her head, refuses to meet his eyes.

He wants to know everything about her. There are days where he will sit down next to her and ask interminable, trivial questions – her favorite color (pink), her favorite food (chips), her favorite movie (The Notebook) – as though memorizing it all for future reference. It wouldn’t surprise her. But this is information she can’t share with him, it hurts enough to relive it in dreams without recounting it all over again.

_Rose,_ he begs. _Please._ When he squeezes her this time, it almost hurts.

She knows he blames himself for the nightmares, just as he does for every wrong that he was not there to prevent. She knows he wishes he could banish these mental terrors the same way he does countless alien nasties. She knows he hates himself for not being able to.

_Please, Rose?_ Well-used to her reluctance, he sets to work kneading her upper back – tangled in knots from tossing and turning – and Rose settles further into his arms. _You’ll feel better after, I promise._

That is how it works in the Doctor’s mind, she knows. Rose wakes up and he is there, Rose tells him what is wrong and he fixes it. He makes her laugh with some stupid joke or story or tells her why the dream would be logically impossible. He reminds her of what _really_ happened.

Rose wishes it were that easy this time.

But how can he comfort her, what can he do, when what _really happened_ is what scares her so much?

He left her.

What's more, he left her by choice.

All for a woman – a blonde, wealthy, eighteenth-century Frenchwoman.

And there wasn't a damn thing she could do about it.

Rose wishes it was just the aliens that scared her – the fear of facing them alone – but aliens she can deal with. But who's to say the same thing won't happen again? he will meet another charming, intelligent, wealthy woman and will go gallivanting off with her, leaving Rose to fend for herself. Who's to say he'll even come back next time? After all, what man would choose Rose over Madame de Bloody Pompadour?

No, what truly frightens her is how her heart will hold up without him. She only has one, after all.

But how can she tell him that? How can she expect him to feel the same way when he already gives her so much – this life she never imagined in her wildest dreams? He dedicates his life to making her happy, doesn't he deserve to be happy as well?

The Doctor's fingers course up and down her spine as he murmurs soothingly into her ear. She knows he wants, more than anything, to heal her as he heals all her physical ills, to live up to his title of _Doctor_.

But how can he protect her from himself?


	5. Nightmares II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor's nightmares this time.

“They go away eventually.” The Doctor squeezes Rose’s shoulder. Poor comfort, but it is the best this body can offer.

_When?_ Her eyes plead with him to answer this question as he has so many others – with a condescending glance and a slew of technical terms.

Rassilon, he wishes he could. But this is not physics or quantum mechanics or the history of Raxacoricofallapatorius. This is a question of emotion and, for once, the answer is not catalogued in that well of information he calls his mind. He has seen enough of human interaction to know it is the type of question where the man says _no_ when asked _does this make me look fat_ or _yes, you’re right dear_ when he grows tired of arguing. Except this is so, _so_ much more important because it’s Rose and she’s crying – he hates it when she cries – and those brown eyes are looking for some answer, any answer.

The Doctor has never been good at this emotional stuff and all he can say is _I don’t know_. He can’t lie to her with an ambiguous _soon_ or even offer a specific time-frame, one couched in so many technical terms she will be unable to wrap her human head around it. She deserves so much more, but all he can give her is the smallest approximation of the truth – he _doesn’t_ know. Oh, but how he wishes he did. For both their sakes.

He wishes it were that simple, that he could mark off the date on a calendar and count down the days – a child waiting for Christmas. He could refuse to sleep till that unknown date – a feat he is more than capable of, he has gone years before – and when he finally _did_ let his eyelids drift shut, it would be in the knowledge that he would not be awakened in a cold sweat, horrific visions – the genocide of Time Lords and Daleks alike – still dancing across his consciousness, playing out in the ship he sees as sanctuary. But the old girl cannot protect him from the menace of his own mind.

It is almost a relief to him when Rose has nightmares. Because on those nights, nights where she wakes, gasping and shaking (sometimes calling out his name in a panic and he is at her side in an instant – _I'm here, I'm here now_ ), he feels needed. And on those long nights when he sits, alone, at the console, lost in his own dark past, he needs someone to need him. After all, it's a bit difficult to brood when he's busy making stupid jokes or squeezing her shoulders or even – in that newer, prettier body – whispering soothing, sweet nothings against her hair.

He falls asleep with her some nights, back propped up against the headboard, her bright-blonde head nestled against his chest. These are nights where they sleep deeply and wake late – Rose stretching contentedly, cat-like, against his chest, he blinking down at her, lips twitching as he watches her claw her way back to reality.

This new body has so few inhibitions toward their pink-and-yellow human that he can't help but use her as a balm against his own terrors. How can he possibly preoccupy himself with the terrors of the Time War when Rose is crying his name?

Hers becomes the voice that invades his worst nightmares. He cannot pinpoint the exact date – on a time machine it is difficult, even for a Time Lord – but falls asleep one night to her (real or imagined?) screams in Magpie's shop the night of the Queen's coronation – the night he abandoned her, left her just as surely as the Wire sucked off her face and _left her in the street_ with her face, her beautiful face, imprisoned in that black-and-white telly, crying out for him on repeat. He hears her plaintive voice over the com that horrible day in Krop Tor, asking _Doctor, what did it mean?_ over and over when Rassilon, he has no idea what it means and he's scared too – terrified even – because what if he can't get back up and what if the _valiant child_ dies in battle this very day and he's not there to stop it? He watches her, mouth formed in a soundless scream as he shouts her name, being sucked away from him and there is nothing he can do to stop it and he has absolutely no idea what it means. He is a Time Lord all is supposed to be known to him – what will be, what may be, _what must not_. There has to be something he can do to stop it but suppose – just suppose – there's not? This is what terrifies him most of all.

And this is what starts him awake some nights, sweat beading his brow, hands shaking as he seeks out the warm body beside him.

_You alright, Doct'r?_ Half-asleep still, she reaches out to him, misses his hand entirely and lands on his bare chest instead, tracing lazy circles. The Doctor isn't one to complain.

He presses a kiss to her hair. “I'm always alright.”

_Mmm._ She burrows further into his chest, muttering incoherently. They sound like affectionate mutters and he chuckles.

It is nights like this when he tells himself that that mystery of a nightmare must not, will not, happen. How dare it presume to be a fixed point in time when he, Time Lord Victorious, the Oncoming Storm, wills it not to be? Because how can she leave – he doesn't like that term, _leave_ , it makes it seem so voluntary but it is still easier to face than _die_ – when he needs her this much? Because how long can he possibly stay alright without her?


	6. Thanksgiving

It is the third Wednesday of July when the Doctor and Rose land on Plymouth Rock on the fourth Thursday of November. At least according to the calendar hanging on her bedroom wall.

According to the Pilgrims that greet them the moment they step out of the TARDIS – Rose dressed in a conservative, Puritan-style dress and the Doctor still in his pinstripes – it is a day to give thanks.

Innocently, the Doctor suggests _Thanksgiving_. Rose shoots him a _look_.

His only reply is a waggle of his eyebrows.

_Well, how do we know I_ wasn't _the one to invent it?_ he asks her later, over dinner, leaning across the heavily-laden table to whisper in her ear. _I am rather brilliant like that._

“And so humble.” Rose grins at him.

_Never said that, did I?_ He winks and she laughs, catches several elderly women giving them scandalized looks, and squeezes his arm for good measure.

They eat until their bellies are full to bursting – turkey and goose and rabbit (which Rose refuses to touch), squash and beans and mashed potatoes, pumpkin and apple and blueberry pies – all with only a minor, drunken scuffle that the Doctor breaks up fairly quickly.

It is pitch-black by the time they begin their halting journey back to the TARDIS – Rose groaning and clutching her stomach, the Doctor already planning _their_ Thanksgiving in that extra-manic, bubbly way he gets when he's just a little bit drunk.

_It'll be great, Rose, you'll see. There'll be turkey – ooh, did I tell you, I saw these great birds over on Barcelona, the planet Barcelona, they're s'posed to be even tastier. We could get one o' them – whaddya think?_ He mistakes her nauseous expression. _Not that we have to kill it . . . but we can always get a turkey back home too – at your mum's, I mean. Kinda my second home, innit? Ooh, we should invite your mum, too, shouldn't we?_ (Rose makes a mental note to remind him of this in future). _She might not be able to cook but she makes great tea – and tea, tea goes great with pie! Pie – it's like liquid cake! And there are so many types – pumpkin, apple, strawberry-rhubarb, banana, now that's my favorite. And it's such a fun word – banaaana, banaaana. . . . I swear, you humans come up with the best . . . you alright, Rose?_

That's when he scoops her up, seemingly unfazed by the mountain of food residing in his digestive tract (damn that superior Time Lord thyroid thingymabobber of his) and carries her over the threshold into the TARDIS.

**. . .**

It is the fourth Thursday of November – according to the calendar tacked to Rose's bedroom wall – when Jackie comes into the TARDIS, carrying a store-bought pumpkin pie and complaining about _crazy aliens_ (the Doctor shrugs) and _you know, this holiday doesn't even exist over here in Britain_ (“It's just about giving thanks, Jackie,” says the Doctor) and _you're carving that bird all wrong_ (“Oh, you want me to take _your_ advice on cooking, Jackie?” the Doctor laughs) and _what's that thing you're pointing at it – is that some weird sex thing?_ (“It's a sonic screwdriver, Jackie,” the Doctor explains and doesn't offer another word).

But when he meets her eyes he smiles and, as he hands her a bowl of cranberry sauce to put on the table, Rose knows exactly what she gives thanks for.


	7. Spa Days

The Doctor can never resist those eyes. Whether it be a minor annoyance (a trip to the universe's largest shopping mall) or a potential paradox (a visit to Pete in Pete's World), he can never just say _no_.

He always starts off with good intentions – _not today, I have to work on the TARDIS_ ; _no, Rose, a parallel world is dangerous enough_ – and she will lower her eyes, just enough that he thinks he's won, before peeking back up, hitting the unsuspecting Doctor with the full force of the Rose Tyler Puppy-Dog Look (patent pending). And suddenly the Doctor finds he can work on the TARDIS another day and, oh, one little visit won't kill them – _but no more than that, Rose Tyler!_

If, in some strange, alternate world, Rose is a drug-dealer, there is no doubt in the Doctor's mind that he is an addict. But here, in this universe, Rose Tyler is a drug all her own, his own _personal brand of heroin_. He cringes at the reference, irritated with himself for committing the quote to memory. Why Rose insists on watching those films, let alone why he sits through them – _we've seen_ Lion King _twenty times, Doctor_ and she lowers her eyes again when he refuses because _vampires do not sparkle, Rose Tyler_ and . . . oh yes, that's why.

Today, it's the spa. Not just any spa, but the largest the universe has to offer, located on the pleasure planet of Manipediuria.

The Doctor only mentions the planet in passing but, when Rose laughs at the name (sounds like an illness) – and despite every instinct screaming otherwise – goes on to expound on Manipediuria's main attraction. The moment the words fall from his lips he wishes he could take them back, but he sees Rose perk up, a glint in her eyes and knows it is too late, far too late.

And so it begins.

The Doctor is rather proud of himself – he lasts a whole three days. He tells her that human biology isn't compatible with the atmosphere ( _I'll take my chances_ ); that there's a nasty alien flu going around that makes you turn blue ( _I'll match the TARDIS, then_ ); that he never would've mentioned it if she hadn't distracted his superior Time Lord brain by painting her nails in the console room and suppose some of that vile _Passion Pink_ substance had spilled on the TARDIS and they were trapped in the Powell Estates with Jackie forever and it was all Rose's fault? (Because what else can he say – that the distraction was her low-cut top and all he could think about was snogging her senseless? Time Lords don't have such carnal needs, and definitely not toward their human companions.)

And all Rose has to say is _Doctor, I need a break_ and, well . . . the spa doesn't sound that bad (his feet have been aching from all that running) and maybe they could use a vacation.

Such a break, the Doctor holds firmly, does not include massages. Particularly not full-body massages. Particularly not full-body massages by six-armed alien masseurs.

Rose puts her name in all the same.

"Look at his skin, Rose. It's _blue_."

_A very nice shade of blue,_ Rose notes, eying said blue skin with interest. She smiles at him and he smiles back – actually it's more like a leer – and lifts one arm in a wave.

The Doctor glares.

"I'll have you know that's the exact shade of blue that alien bug makes you turn" – _your fantasy flu, Doctor?_ – "I told you, it's only in rural areas, but we don't know where _he_ comes from, do we? I'm not taking chances with your health, Rose."

Cavalier with her safety as always, Rose is halfway across the foyer. The masseur offers a towel and she takes it; he says something and she laughs – _no, not my boyfriend_ ; he leers again, places a hand on the small of her back.

The Doctor wants to punch him.

Instead, he signs up for a massage. Crossing all six of his arms across his bare chest – is that really necessary? isn't it unhygienic? – the masseur sighs and nods for the Doctor to follow. His hand returns to Rose's back.

He leads them through a labyrinth of passageways – ambiguously toned moans sound from a few half-open doors and the Doctor eyes their guide still more warily – into a stark white room. Soothing music echoes from its' walls but it does nothing to soothe the Doctor who, ignoring the changing rooms entirely, quickly strips, baring his own chest in silent challenge.

The masseur hands him a robe. "You're naked."

"Oh, yes." The Doctor holds his gaze fiercely as he slips into the robe, only breaking off to smile broadly at Rose as she enters the room, discarded clothing tucked neatly under one arm.

Oozing that same slimy charm (and apparently undeterred by the Doctor's display of manliness) the masseur reaches for the bunched clothing – _here, let me take those for you_ – and, while two hands close around the jeans and T-shirt, the fingers of another brush her breast: a breast, the Doctor is suddenly very aware, that is covered by nothing but a thin robe.

The Doctor _really_ wants to punch him.

The masseur gestures for the Doctor to lie down on one of the massage tables (he doesn't) and leads Rose over to the other. She loosens the robe's tie before lying face-down, casting the Doctor a concerned glance as she does so. The Doctor, however, is too fixated on the man hovering above her – two hands sliding the robe down her shoulders, another pair covering her with a sheet (just as thin as the robe), and the third . . . well, the third. . . .

He never realized how hard faces were.

Then Rose is saying – almost shouting – _no, Doctor, stop it_ and _I know you get jealous, but this is ridiculous_ and _for God's sake, he thought you were gay!_ The Doctor looks down, just enough to make her think she's won, before he peeks back up, hitting his unsuspecting Rose with the full force of the Doctor Puppy-Dog Look (patent pending).

All of a sudden Rose is having a hard time maintaining her glare and, _oh, it isn't such a big deal_ (the masseur was rather handsy) – _but don't do it again, Doctor!_ – and his offer of a massage ( _much better than that lot_ and he gestures at the pink planet receding in the distance) doesn't sound so bad after all. Her only condition, accompanied by a Look of her own, is that he throw in a pedicure while he's at it and, as he is widely-renowned for his massage and nail-art skills – _ask anyone, Rose!_ – the Doctor obliges.

He is as good as his word; the work of his nimble finger – across her shoulders and down her spinal column, into the arches of her calves and the soles of her feet – sends shivers down both their spines. The Doctor brushes her inner thigh, a happy accident, and the leg twitches in response; she turns to watch him and he knows that if he were to try something, Look or not, she would not push him away.

The Doctor removes his hand, moves to her toes instead. She laughs as his fingers brush a sensitive spot and kicks out, but he holds her firmly, studying the symbol he has tattooed onto the ten digits.

She asks him what it means: Ten circles within circles on a TARDIS-blue background. He tells her it's Gallifreyan, that it means _Rose_.

"Mine," he translates now, voice so low as to be indiscernible. He says it again, moving down her foot, daring her to detect it. "Mine, mine, mine."


	8. Sick Days

Rose Tyler may not know many Time Lords but, take away the whole regeneration and Lord of Time bits, and they're just like any other human male (if ten times more arrogant). The Doctor is living proof.

_Time Lords do not snore, Rose Tyler._

They do. Loudly.

_Time Lords do not watch sappy romances, Rose Tyler._

They do. And they cry when hero and heroine in said sappy romance kiss.

_Time Lords do not ask for directions, Rose Tyler._

They should. So that they do not pilot themselves and their (very forgiving) companion to another planet in the midst of a civil war when they were supposed to have arrived a century earlier, on a planet in a separate galaxy altogether, in the first place.

So when the Doctor tells her Time Lords don't get sick – already too hoarse to tack on the requisite _Rose Tyler_ – Rose is not at all surprised to find him bed-ridden the next morning, barely able to speak (a welcome change) and scribbling furiously on a pad of paper.

_Rose, I'm dying._

Fighting the urge to roll her eyes, Rose places a reassuring hand on his arm. “It’s just a cold, Doctor. Sure, they’re not fun, but they’re not fatal – at least not where I come from.”

The Doctor shakes his head mournfully, shows her the paper again.

_Time Lord immune systems are designed to fight off all manner of diseases. If I’ve caught something as simple as a cold, that means that my immunity has been compromised in some way and my body is beginning to shut down._

“That, or you’re not as brilliant as you think you are.” He pouts and sniffles and looks so forlorn that, despite his written refute of _Impossible_ , Rose softens slightly. “Calm down, Doctor, it's just a cold.”

But _it is not just a cold, Rose Tyler_. It is a life-threatening illness – _and I'd really rather not use one of my regenerations on this, never mind if I might be ginger_ – that could come to claim him at any moment and . . . _that tastes horrible, Rose Tyler, isn't this plague doing a good enough job of killing me?_ The glare he sends her way is  rather lessened by his bloodshot eyes and runny nose.

It doesn't kill him. In fact, it might have just made him ever so slightly better, enough to manage some tea and toast (plus a banana milkshake she gets from the corner store because they're supposed to speed up the Gallifreyan healing process and Rose doesn't have the heart to argue).

She doesn't have the heart to argue much over the next few days – watching _Lion King_ (his favorite) and _Tangled_ (her favorite) till they both know the songs by heart, reading aloud from Harry Potter (he loves her Luna impression but stops her with a worried expression when he hears her own voice grow hoarse), falling asleep with his arms wrapped tight around her, a child with an oversized teddy-bear. Honestly, she doesn't much mind that last one; doesn't mind any of them, really, just as long as his hand is in hers and he's staring at her with that look in his eyes – as if she is the only person in this whole terrifying universe who can save him and he only needs her to _stay, Rose, please stay – just for tonight_.

If Rose is ever-so slightly disappointed when he begins babbling and bounding about the TARDIS once more, she tells herself that it's just sleep she's after – she hasn't gotten much the past few days, an occupational hazard of sleeping with a sick man – and why should she let prime teasing material go to waste?

She can only offer half-hearted jibes – not at all up to her usual standard – but the Doctor gives her _“A” for effort_ all the same (a lie, but a nice one).

“I thought Time Lords didn't get sick, Doctor.” As he nurses a cup of tea and Rose attempts to clear sleep from her eyes.

“Sure you're not gonna regenerate on me?” As he tinkers with the TARDIS, unnecessary glasses perched on the tip of his nose and Rose clears her unnaturally scratchy throat.

“Should all them Daleks watch out for the Oncoming Sneeze then?” As Rose begins a sneezing fit of her own and the Doctor is quick to bundle her off to bed.

They watch _The Notebook_ (her favorite) and _Romeo and Juliet_ (his favorite, because if it has to be a romance, it might as well be something by Shakespeare) and _Pride and Prejudice_ (another one of her favorites and when he reads her the novel, found in the TARDIS library, she laughs at his Mrs. Bennet impression until she starts to hack and he stops himself short). He brings her cup after cup of tea and chicken soup (from the cafe down the street though he swears he made it) and enough tissues to paper her bedroom.

Rose doesn't have to ask him to stay and he doesn't ask if she wants him to, simply does. He curls an arm protectively around her and drapes his overcoat across them both – a makeshift security blanket. She wakes what might be hours, what might be minutes later, to his tie tickling her nose; he is humming some strange tune and she doesn't think he realizes she's awake. He would never look at her like that otherwise – that same awed expression he wore a few days ago, as if she is the only person in this whole, terrifying universe.

As if, even now, she is the one saving him.


	9. The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nine/Rose and Ten/Rose in this one. :)

The Doctor frowns at the wreath adorning Rose's door and the mistletoe Jack has placed over every lintel. He forbids them to get a Christmas tree for the console room – _foreign substances aren't good for the old girl and who knows what chemicals you humans sprayed them down with_ – and only shrugs when Rose calls him a Grinch. He knows better than to try and explain – saying you don't like Christmas, in any period of human culture, is nothing less than blasphemy.

It isn't the relentlessly cheery tunes that tear at the eardrums ( _you're a mean one, Mr. Grinch!_ Rose and Jack belt out) or the overindulgence the entire holiday season glorifies with its' honeyed ham and Christmas crackers and pudding or even the rampant commercialization that engenders such crazy shoppers (or do the consumers cause the commercialization? A question for the philosophers). To be honest, he is rather fond of it all. A whole planet full of people running around, looking for the biggest tree and the perfect presents and the brightest lights, and all for one day of controlled chaos that ends in torn wrapping paper and stuffed stomachs. It's ridiculous, but it is the sheer magnitude of that ridiculousness – a whole _planet_ with such screwed-up priorities – that helps him forget exactly what _his_ priorities are.

Forget that it's his job to save them, to be there every day (and certainly every Christmas – he can only guess the rest of the universe is not as amused by the holiday as he is) because without him there will be no more oversized Christmas trees or overindulgent Christmas dinner or overpriced pieces of the newest silly technology (all of which the Doctor has seen on other planets several centuries earlier). Because unless he plays the Grinch, the rest of the universe will instead and the Doctor is still rather fond of the Whos down in Whoville (a pink-and-yellow one in particular). Because he, with his leather jacket and blue police-box, is the closest thing to Santa Claus this planet has, and the whole magic of Santa is his seeming nonexistence. (That’s enough Christmas analogies for now, any more and he’ll have to accept the spiked eggnog that a just slightly tipsy Jack is offering and get into the true _spirit of Christmas_ and before you know it, Daleks or Racnoss or Slitheen will have destroyed half of London).

The Doctor does his best to ignore the tree that shows up – quite mysteriously – in the console room the next day (mostly because when he tries to squeeze it back through the door – the TARDIS not being at all accommodating – Rose and Jack put up such a fuss and it's hard to be a Grinch when she turns _those_ eyes on you). So disregard is his method of choice – along with some well-placed scoffs and sneers about _stupid apes_ and their _inane holidays_ that really pull the whole thing together.

Retreating to his study with one last, scornful glance over his shoulder – Rose is twining gold tinsel around herself like a feather boa and giggling like mad – the Doctor slams the door with unnecessary vigor. The heavy wood muffles the sound of the non-stop Christmas tunes that the TARDIS insists on playing but it is not so easy to banish the lyrics from his head ( _have a holly-jolly Christmas_ / _jingle bells, jingle bells_ / _walking in a winter wonderland_ ). At least he isn't having _thoughts of sugarplums_.

Not so easy either to reject Rose's incessant invitations: to come decorate the tree, play a drinking game against any number of classic Christmas films ( _drink every time Charlie Brown complains about his life_ , _drink whenever Rudolph's nose glows_ ), join them for a sobering meal of hot cocoa and cookies. _Mebbe even bananas,_ Rose laughs (more-than-slightly tipsily this time), giving him a tongue-between-her-teeth grin. _An' that's not an innuendo, Doctah._

It hurts to wipe that grin off her face, and he ignores the urge to call her back, to take her hand in his and sit by the Christmas tree (lit brightly enough to power her flat for a week) with a cup of cocoa and a banana biscuit. Time Lords don't engage in such frivolity; Time Lords sit in their studies and read books on metaphysics while their silly human companions become steadily more boisterous. And metaphysics is much more interesting, isn't it?

Impossible to ignore, however, is the neatly-wrapped package Rose presents him with on – by her calculations – Christmas Eve.

_To: The Doctor_

_From: Rose_

_I know you're not one for Christmas but – sod it, just open it, you crazy Time Lord._

The Doctor doesn't plan to, means only to smile and thank her – he can't bring himself to wipe that smile off her face on today of all days – and leave the mysterious package on a shelf in the storage room. Because Time Lords do not receive Christmas gifts, particularly not Christmas gifts in red-and-green wrapping paper with smiling snowmen (imagine how many trees are killed every year just to make wrapping paper) and suddenly it is _sod the trees_ and the Doctor is tearing at the paper, as eager as a child on – well, on _Christmas_ – to discover what Santa (his own personal Santa, his Rose Tyler) has left for him.

_It's not much. . . ._

It is a signed copy of Dickens's _Christmas Carol_. He stares, shell-shocked.

“Rose. . . .”

_I know, it was a dumb idea._ She is babbling worse than him. _Just, when we visited Victorian England a few weeks ago, he was havin' some reading. And you and Jack were off doing alien stuff and he remembered me and . . . I thought, well, never mind. . . ._

“Rose.” The Doctor can't stop himself from laughing. “Rose, it's fantastic. Really. But I didn't get you anything. Isn't that a tradition with you humans – exchanging gifts?”

It's Rose's turn to laugh. _Doctor, you let me travel the universe in your time-and-spaceship. That's a lifetime's worth of presents right there._

But it isn't enough. It will never be enough. Because Rose isn't there for any selfless, charitable reason; it wasn't any outpouring of generosity that made him invite her aboard – not just once, but twice, he never asks twice. No, he simply couldn't stand being alone because when he was alone all he could see was Gallifrey, burning, and when he was with her all he could see – all he could think about –  was her brown eyes and her blonde hair and her kind smile. Plus she had saved his life, that might come in useful. (He doesn't know what he would have done if she had said no a second time, maybe join Mickey, trailing behind her like a lovesick puppy-dog.)

Her mere presence on this time-and-space ship is a gift to him – a gift that can't be met with any amount of jewelry or tropical vacations or shopping expeditions. No matter what, he always comes up short.

In the end, the best he can do is send her away, back to Jackie and Mickey and the rest, in the hopes that this – their – fantastic life will fuel an even-more-fantastic future. After all, she knows what's out there now, knows there is so much more to life than working and eating and sleeping. She deserves to find someone who feels the same – someone who has glimpsed something strange out of the very corner of his eye and has kept on looking, someone who can buy proper Christmas gifts, someone who isn't a grumpy-faced, big-eared old Time Lord – to share that fantastic life with (so what if he can't envision the same, can't even comprehend what _fantastic_ is without Rose Tyler? She deserves so much more than him, so much _better_ ).

But she comes back (of course she comes back, how could he have thought it would go any other way, Rose Tyler eats the impossible for breakfast) and he's furious (why would she come back, throw that final gift in his face? Oh, isn't that just like a human) and frightened (she's going to _burn_ if he doesn't do something and what sort of gratitude would that be?) and exhilarated  (lips still tingling from the kiss – that _kiss_ – he knows that he only has a few moments left but it's alright, everything's alright, if only he can keep looking into her eyes) all at once. And by the time the dust finally settles – Rose brought home for Christmas (another attempt at a present, aborted by the annual alien invasion), the Sycorax defeated (and disintegrated by one Harriet Jones), and a whole pot of Jackie's restorative tea drained – the Doctor is a new man.

What type of man he has yet to discover. Does he still like bananas in his pancakes? Is his favorite color still blue?

Is this body the type of man who sticks around for Christmas dinner and brings a banana-cream pie for afters? Is this strange man, with his new teeth and new-new hand, the type to sit with Rose by the Christmas tree and throw an arm casually around her shoulders and sing carols? Is this Doctor the type to exclaim excitedly over the T-shirt Rose gives him ( _"Trust me, I'm a doctor" – brilliant!_ ) and to hand her  a gift in return (a necklace he picked up at an alien bazaar when he spotted her looking, not altogether sure if he planned to give it to her or not) and grin goofily when she gasps in surprise?

He thinks he might be, hopes he might be.

He dares to believe that this man is the man Rose Tyler needs.


	10. The Most Terrible Time of the Month

Rose Tyler has never been the type of girl to mark it down on a calendar; with double-shifts at Henrik's, domestic duties, and rare nights out with the girls, she doesn't have the time to keep track. In all honesty, she doesn't know any real girls who do, they all seem to exist as quirky rom-com heroines whose sole purpose in life is to have great hair, killer legs, and a gorgeous boyfriend to come home to (in a flat no normal twenty-something could afford) who said heroine can shag to her heart's content without fear of getting pregnant because she knows exactly where she is – down to the minute – in her ovulation cycle. (Rose's hair is alright on the best of days, her legs could do with work, and she still lives in a flat with her mum. She has had one pregnancy scare with Jimmy who, while undoubtedly gorgeous, advises her to cool it on the chips for a little while when the stick shows up negative because _I don't date fatties_ and abandons her a month later.)

She and Mickey don't do it often enough – whether because she's so busy or because she just doesn't care enough, Rose isn't sure – to justify worry and on the TARDIS it is difficult enough to keep track of the current day, never mind thirty of them between one period and the next.

The Doctor remembers anyway. Heating pads are placed in any room on the TARDIS she may happen to frequent and Rose's favorite films mysteriously make their way into the DVD player in the days preceding. One day, she catches him stocking one of the cupboards with her favorite chocolates, ready to be miraculously discovered in the case of a craving, and is simultaneously overwhelmed with incredible affection ( _he is the sweetest man, my God, I love him so much_ ) and irritation ( _I can take care of myself – I'm just as capable as buying that stuff as he is, just trying to watch my figure is all. God, I'm fat_ ). She settles for crying instead.

_It's alright,_ the Doctor soothes, murmuring the words against her hair. _Happens to the best of us. Besides, you only have one more day till your menstruation begins and your hormones are all over the place._

“How do you even _know_ that?” Rose snaps. Words like _menstruation_ aren't supposed to sound that sexy slipping off the tongue.

_Well,_ he hedges. _I smell you._

“I smell?”

_No! Yes. Not really . . . a little. You see, your body exudes certain chemicals at certain points in . . . but it's lovely, really. You smell like – like Rose, your own personal perfume. They should bottle it: Eau de Rose, they'd make millions._ He beams at her, but looks horrified as her eyes fill with tears again.

_Really, Rose, you smell beautiful. Best scent in the universe, you are. I'm telling you, I'd bottle you up and . . . sorry, that sounds wrong. Who's up for chips? Chips sound good? I'll go and get chips. Salt-and-vinegar?_

“Am I really that scary?” Rose asks the next day, curled up in bed – the Doctor correct, as per usual, in his estimation of her menstruation – with another meal of chips ( _the greasiest I could find_ ) and Cadbury chocolate, the Doctor sitting attentively by her side.

The Doctor only scoffs, reaching over to adjust the heating pad on her abdomen. _Rose Tyler, I've faced down Daleks. . . ._

“And a girl on her period makes you shake in your Converse.” Rose laughs, wincing as another cramp courses through her, and is quick to accept the pain pills he proffers (it has barely been four hours but he keeps them up like clockwork).

_I'm a Doctor, Rose. I don't like seeing anyone in pain. Especially_ – and for a moment, she thinks he will say _you_ , the word floating in the air between them even now, an unspoken promise but he finishes instead: _not with something so barbaric._

“ _Barbaric_? Why don't you go and call me a _stupid ape_ while you're at it. Been a whole week since you've done that.” Rose pelts a chip at his head; he catches it and pops it into her partially-open mouth before licking the salt off his own fingertips.

_It is, though. You human women have to go through this every month, don't you? Only stops if you get pregnant; of course, then you have to go through childbirth anyway. I've delivered a few children in my day and it doesn't seem a whole lot of fun. And all because those first humans – now they were really stupid apes – ate the wrong piece of fruit and your God was feeling a bit tetchy. Bet it was a pear, I've never liked pears. Now a banana, He'd probably have forgiven them for that, just gone 'don't do it again' or sommat. They're too delicious to really make a fuss over, aren't they? And a great source of potassium. . . ._

“What about your lot, then?” Rose asks, abruptly cutting off his babble. “Don't Gallifreyan women . . . sorry, I shouldn't have asked, forget it.” But she catches sight of his expression, turned haunted and pensive at the mere mention of his former home, and knows he is already there, bearing witness where no one else can.

He tells her that Gallifreyans didn't have children in the traditional way and didn't have to worry about messy little things like fertilization and menstruation and a bunch of other -ations. He tells her that the _conception_ is a ceremonial process between husband and wife and the child is little more than a blend of ingredients, a genetic soup. He tells her that, though Gallifreyan parents care for their children, marriages are arranged, a bonding of two like minds, advantageous only in the knowledge to be gained. He tells her – Rose not exactly sure why he is telling her but the words seem to be coming too fast for him to stop them now – that any other feelings are discouraged (if not, in the more rebellious cases, eliminated altogether), that a Time Lord's solitary purpose is to be just that – a lord of time, knowing all there is to know – and everything else just gets in the way.

Rose hisses in pain and she sees the Doctor's fingers clench before his eyes grow soft. He leans forward to readjust the heating pad, leaving his hand there for just a moment to rub soothing circles across her skin. He clears away the chips and chocolate wrappers before he presents her with a cup of honeyed tea ( _two hours till the next dose, Rose, I'm sorry_ ) and asks if she wants to watch a film.

He flips on the television, _When Harry Met Sally_ already in the player, and settles in next to her, stroking her hair when she uses his chest as a pillow.

He stays all night.


	11. Nights In

The Doctor refuses to call it cuddling. He may have lost the debates over which film to watch ( _oh, I know you love it – I saw you crying_ ) and where they should get take-out from ( _the last time we ate there, my noodles had a_ tentacle _in it, Doctor – a still_ moving _tentacle_ ) and even when he should stop tinkering and _come sit down, Doctor, she'll still be there in the morning_ but this is one he intends to win.

He calls it sitting-and-hugging (Rose only raises her eyebrows and says that’s a strangely uncreative name for a man who has seen all the planets in the universe and promptly christens it the very unmanly _shugging_ instead); he calls it curling-up-on-the-couch-in-close-proximity-to-one-another-ing (shortened to _curling up together_  by Rose); he calls it what-I-do-when-Rose-gets-scared-of-the-monsters/ax-murderers/vengeful spirits-on-the-screen-ing (this one he keeps to himself because what would Rose say if she knew some of these films frightened him just as much – how humans can come up with more terrifying things than what is already out there never ceases to amaze him – and he only chose them to get away with inching just that little bit closer, squeezing just that little bit tighter).

The Doctor refuses to call it snuggling. They may both be in their pajamas with cups of tea on the side table and when Rose reaches up to take the latest Harry Potter off the shelf, he may be unusually fixated by that small patch of skin between the waist of her pants and the bottom of her top, may even have inched a little bit closer (so they can both see the words, of course), but that does not make it a snuggle or a cuddle or any other words that bring to mind roaring fires and happy couples (not that there _isn't_  a roaring – albeit artificial – fire and not that they _aren’t_ a happy couple of time-travelers). He calls it their library time (and Rose adds on a _relative silence in the_  on to the nickname because, with his voice weaving a web of words around them _this is the quietest you ever are, Doctor_ ); he calls it reading-together-in-close-proximity-to-each-another-ing ( _reading, you mean,_ Rose says succinctly); to himself, he calls it Rose-distracting-me-when-I'm-trying-to-concentrate-on-the-words-ing.

It’s not that he minds; he quite enjoys it, really – popping the _p_ on _Potter_ just like Draco Malfoy and dropping his _g_ 's as Hagrid (though Rose maintains, with a tongue-touched grin, that his Barty Crouch Jr. voice is her favorite) – yet it is a pleasure tempered by pain. To brush her hair away when a few stray strands fall across the page and tuck it behind her ear; to let his fingers linger on her cheek for just that one extra second and he holds his breath – a feeble attempt to make the moment last just that one extra second longer – before turning back to the book as he inevitably must, voice suddenly growing snide as he becomes Severus Snape.

The Doctor refuses to call it spooning. Even when the television goes dark or his voice grows too hoarse to read and he knows he should move her but she just looks so peaceful there on his arm, a slight flush to her makeup-less cheeks and a small smile tugging at the corners of her mouth even in sleep and it is all just so _right_ that he can’t bear to let it end with nothing more than a mumbled Doctor as he tucks her into bed and a chaste kiss to her temple. So he sits instead, his arm growing steadily more numb, letting his thoughts drift and trying to ignore the fact that those thoughts, like every other part of him, always return to her – how beautiful, how funny, how fantastic she is and how did he ever get so lucky and Rassilon, he should tell her, needs to tell her, _will_ tell her. In the morning, though: she’ll kill him if he wakes her up now (he quite likes this body) and his own eyelids are growing heavy (it’s been a while since he’s last slept and if he lies Rose down like this – careful not to wake her – then it’s quite comfortable to press against her, to throw an arm across her waist, to feel how right this is and he should have done it long ago).

The Doctor will reunite with logic – that amazing, terrible thing – in the morning. He will call what they are doing lying-down-and-hugging; he will call it what-happens-when-Rose-Tyler-falls-asleep-on-my-arm-ing; he will call it why-we-shouldn't-have-gotten-such-a-comfortable-couch-ing and Rose will bury her face in his chest, too tired to come up with proper names for any of these long-winded titles. The Doctor will not tell her there’s a much simpler word for it all, a much shorter word, a word he can’t say because cuddling, snuggling, spooning is what-I-do-instead-of-that-other-thing-that-thing-I-can’t-believe-I-even-thought-about-doing-ing.

Instead, he calls it _Rose Tyler, you are brilliant_ (and she replies _not too bad yourself_ ); he calls it _where would I be without you_ (and Rose suggests _same old life, last of the Time Lords?_ ); he calls it _how long are you going to stay with me_ (and Rose says _forever_ ).


	12. Nights Out

Rose knows the Doctor knows where she disappears off to in the hours after he announces the next interplanetary soiree or eighteenth-century ball they will be attending (as Sir Doctor and Dame Rose) but it doesn't stop him from bursting into the wardrobe room, gasping her name, eyes wild and hair even more windswept than usual from numerous nervous rufflings, only to mouth soundlessly when he catches her holding a dress up for inspection or testing out a new pair of heels. (Once it is as she is slipping out of her T-shirt and he hastily averts his gaze, speaking to the wall as he accuses her of _disappearing on me_ ).

“Where else did you expect me to go, Doctor?” she asks, an answer to his shell-shocked look. “You only gave me two hours to get ready.” And she pushes him to the door, amidst mutters that she spends _more time on this than I do on the TARDIS_ (“Next time I'm too busy here to eat dinner, let me know, alright?” she replies, somewhat snappishly).

It's really his fault for showing her the room in the first place. Working at Henrik's for three years had jaded Rose toward the current fashions of short skirts and spaghetti-strap tops – she is more comfortable in T-shirts and jeans than anything – and when the Doctor advises she find an outfit better suited to Victorian England, she only hopes to find a dress that covered the important bits (the last time she went out with Shareen, she couldn't stop pulling on the hem of her sequined silver piece of fabric – to call it a dress was laughable).

What she finds instead is paradise. Rose doesn't know how a time-traveling man came to collect so many female garments or how one of her favorite shirts has made its' way onto a shelf, hundreds of years away from home. She isn't sure she even wants to know. In the span of a few hours, her world has been turned on its' head and while very few facts remain factual, there are a few things Rose Tyler knows for sure: TARDIS stands for Time And Relative Dimension In Space and is piloted by a maybe-slightly-mad man called the Doctor, the world ends in the year five-billion and, on the rack nearest her, is one of the most beautiful dresses she has ever seen.

Rose can't remember feeling so excited about a piece of clothing since she was five years old and got a pink princess dress to wear to her sixth birthday party. She feels like a real _lady_ – the kind her mother exhorted her to be when she found said princess dress covered in mud and grass-stains – and the Doctor's reaction, despite his _for a human_ proviso, seals the deal. She is in love.

It is the same reaction – with no attempt at any condition: she is Rose, she is beautiful, that is all there is to it – she receives that night, dressed in a floor-length strapless red number, her hair in a complicated up-do and he gapes for a second, fingers fumbling on the clasp of the dangling necklace (the one he gave her last Christmas, the flower-shaped pendant glinting on her collarbone), before offering his arm and stepping out with her, into the dark, toward the beckoning lights.

There are extravagant dinners where the Doctor whispers the names of the more tentacle-y looking dishes (and diplomats) into her ear ( _it's boiled kraken, really, Rose, it's good, you don't need to make_  that _face_ ; _that's the prince of the Fanallians – no, don't look straight at him, he'll see it as a challenge_ ). There are dances, most of which she knows none of the steps to, and when numerous gentlemen offer to teach her, the Fanallian prince – who seems to have no problem with direct eye contact – among them, the Doctor tersely replies that he is more than capable and pulls Rose with him onto the floor. Even though he hates the slow songs, even though he stumbles his way through the whole thing and they are nearly run over by a couple of Fanolians who, it turns out, do take challenge with direct eye contact ( _but it’s a very easy mistake to make,_ says the Doctor once they are safely back in the TARDIS and he is massaging the soles of her feet, sore from running in stiletto heels).

Because there are always disasters – of course there are, the Doctor attracts such things like flies to honey. There is always an assassin to be incapacitated or a three-tiered cake to be destroyed (though infused with a poison that would have turned all the guests to slime, the bride isn't too understanding) or a ridiculous arrest to be resisted (one which could have been avoided altogether if the Doctor hadn’t fed her that bite of kraken – a jailable offense, _but I didn’t know, Rose . . . besides, it was good wasn’t it?_ ) and by the time it is all over, by the time the dust finally settles and Rose toes off her shoes and collapses in the console chair – her dress torn and stained with various substances and her hair fallen chaotically about her face – she feels just like that little girl, caught tussling in the mud with Mickey – exhausted and dirty but triumphant all the same.

Rose grins to herself, a shadow of that little girl flitting across her face, and when she looks up it is half-expecting to find Jackie looming over her, shouting to _get your arse back home right now, young lady_ and _enough of these crazy adventures_ and _what were you_ thinking _, you could have been killed_.

But it's only the Doctor – unlucky tux stained with a nasty green fluid and a tie wrapped around a gash on his left arm – babbling on about their next date night (she doesn't know when _nights on the town_ became _date nights_ but doesn't risk complaining, this is the man who refuses to call cuddling _cuddling_ , after all); and the burn to her thigh (she insists on applying the cream to it herself, the last thing she needs is those fingers, detached and methodical, skating across her skin); and wouldn't she like to get into something more comfortable (she knows it isn't a come-on, knows he is only referring to her usual evening-wear of sweatpants and T-shirt, but it becomes difficult to remember as he leans in to unclasp the necklace, lips inches from hers, that same look in his eyes as when they first stepped toward the beckoning lights and she was Rose and she was beautiful and that was all there was – _is_ – to it).

All the while she beams, exhausted and dirty and triumphant.


	13. Shopping

The Doctor, contrary to popular belief (particularly the belief of one Jackie Tyler who still will not let go of the fact that he once – _once_ – dropped her daughter off a year later than intended), is an organized person. He has a library with books categorized by author, genre, and planet (making it much easier for Rose to find those silly alien romances she loves so much); a roomful of spare parts, with the application and quantity of each clearly labeled (this, if he asks Rose to grab something while he tinkers, he knows their functions like the back of his new-new hand); a wardrobe room with garments sorted by time period (where Rose can spend hours picking through the racks of Victorian and Roman and Egyptian eras, _ooh_ ing and _aah_ ing).

To be fair, much of this is the TARDIS’s doing – shelving a book back in its’ proper place and refolding discarded outfits – something Rose never loses the opportunity to rib him about. In her mind, he is the hopeless Time Lord to whom domestics are as foreign as Gallifreyan is to her, and the Doctor does not dispel her of this notion. It is much easier to live up (or rather, down) to these expectations – the man who blows up kitchen implements on a regular basis and is unable to sit still for more than five minutes at a time (his tapping foot or drumming fingers only silenced by Rose’s calming touch) – than to succumb to the _domestic life_.

Rose knows this. Rose understands this. And _still_ , Rose asks him to take care of the shopping – _it would be such a help if you could do this, Doctor . . . or would you like to visit Mum instead_ , leaving him with no other choice, really – so is it really his fault when he returns home laden with bags of bananas and jam and several unidentifiable cartons of stuff that he snagged along the way? Because how can they be expected to make anything _interesting_ with simple, boring bread and milk and eggs (Rose suggests French toast with bananas, seeing as we have enough for five years); how can he follow those inflexible scrawls of _OJ_ and _ice cream_ when there is cucumber juice and mango popsicles to be tried and tested? How can he presume to know what they need when a horizon of possibilities is forever expanding in front of him?

Rose returns the juice and, unused shopping list in hand, strides purposefully down the aisles, a determined glint in her eye. The Doctor knows this look, knows there is no arguing with her, and follows behind, grabbing the items she requests from the high shelves, now and again glancing ruefully at the cart’s contents – flour and sugar, meat and cheese. Practicality personified.

Suddenly, unexpectedly, a tin of banana biscuits clatters into the carriage and the Doctor turns from his miserable inspection of the shelves, a question on his lips. Eyes dancing, Rose entwines her fingers with his, whispers _Run_ into the shell of his ear. And they are off, sprinting down the aisles at breakneck speed, Rose brandishing the bar-code scanner, a makeshift weapon, as she aims it at various items.

“Rose.” The Doctor attempts to slow their frantic pace, to ascertain what sort of threat they have to deal with (that old woman comparing turnips looked suspicious), but finds himself tugged irresistibly onward. “Rose, what is it?”

A dozen eggs shake dangerously in their carton and a yolk drips out from between the metal slats of the carriage. Quickly, the Doctor sidesteps to avoid it.

“What's wrong? What did you see?”

Several cans of vegetables – carrots, zucchini, asparagus – are thrown into the cart, squashing a loaf of bread in the process.

“Rose, I think our safety is a bit more important than . . . what is that?” An unidentifiable _something_ joins the medley of items.

_No idea._ She laughs, the sound as manic as his own, and when he joins in the old lady comparing turnips looks up at them, her expression caught somewhere between fear and envy.

They come home laden with bags of bread, milk, and eggs; banana biscuits, crisps, and several mysterious cartons of stuff, a second bottle of cucumber juice amongst them which Rose, after twisting open the bottle despite the Doctor’s offers to return it, pronounces _not half-bad_.

_Try a sip, Doctor?_ Cautiously, he does, and gags the second it hits his tongue. He glares – you _minx_ , Rose Tyler – and grabs for her but as she dances just out of reach, grinning that tongue-touched grin, he settles instead for pelting a glob of apple jam at her cheek. Squealing, she dives for cover behind the countertop and reappears armed with a tub of chocolate frosting, a handful of which she sends catapulting across the kitchen, straight into the Doctor’s hair.

Now this means war.

Numerous jars are emptied on either side by the time the Doctor waves a dish towel in tacit surrender, only to attack in full force once she is within tickling distance, fingertips fluttering across her ribs and stomach as she cries _no fair_ and _that's cheating_ and _fine, fine, you win_ , in between wild bursts of laughter. One last playful poke to her belly and the Doctor relents, sitting back against the counter and pulling Rose in close. Idly skating a finger along her collarbone, the Doctor licks off the sticky substance that coats the tip; he dips back down for more – a child going for a second cookie – only to halt as he feels Rose shudder under his touch.

Because otherwise he will go back a third and a fourth and a fifth time. Otherwise, they will end up on the kitchen floor or the table or maybe even his bedroom (if they manage to get that far) with the Doctor licking that stickiness off of every part of her body, tasting what has so long eluded him, that taste that is better than bananas and jam (and most certainly better than cucumber juice), that taste that is so uniquely _Rose_. Otherwise, come morning, she will not be able to look at him, will pack her bags and stare at the floor when she asks politely – too politely, the type of tone one would use with a near-stranger – to be brought home.

Because to avoid that terrible occurrence he must refuse this wonderful one. He has lasted this long, what is one more forever?

So when Rose excuses herself to go take a shower, he smiles and makes a quip about humans and their obsession with cleanliness, trying his best not to wonder what exactly she meant in her suggestion that a cold shower wouldn't do him any harm, either. In an attempt at distraction, he surveys the detritus of their short-lived battle, thanking the TARDIS in advance for the surfaces that will soon be clean and sparkling again. Still, he knows the old girl will leave them some cleaning up to do; they are entirely culpable for this mess.

Picking up the emptied bottle of cucumber juice – he is not entirely sure where the contents got to, hopefully not his hair – the Doctor tosses it in the bin. They will have to make another shopping trip, too.

He takes out his own list. It has no bread or milk or eggs (or even bananas), is covered instead with the circular writing of his people: _watching telly_ and _morning cup of tea_ , it reads; _trip to the beach_ and _Sunday dinner_.

_Grocery shopping_ , he writes at the very bottom. He casts a tender eye down the list before rolling up the piece of paper and stuffing it back into one of the capacious pockets of his coat, filled with other bits and bobs: spare parts and snacks, alien artifacts and pieces of paper scribbled over with alien scribblings (scribblings Rose will never be able to decipher if she does one day happen upon them) that will one day become artifacts in the annals of the last Time Lord.

Contrary to popular belief, the Doctor is an organized person. These are his memories and his remembrances, his hopes and dreams of a future that has yet come to pass.

These are what will remain when this forever is over and done, these lists that are ever-growing, ever-changing.

_Planets I Have Taken Rose To_. _Planets I Will Take Rose To_ (will underlined twice for good measure).

_Famous People/"Aliens" To Meet_. _Films to Watch & Books to Read_ (better with two implicit in the very nature of these activities, impossible to imagine time in the cinema room or library without his pink-and-yellow human by his side).

_Domestics That Are Maybe Not-So-Bad After All_.

In the end, it will hurt. He knows it will hurt, knows just as well that there is no way he could stop himself if he tried. He is pulled irresistibly forward, toward the edge of that cliff, a smile on his face the whole time.

But it is worth it. Rose is always worth it.


	14. The First Time

Rose is always the first to say it.

With Jimmy, it was a matter of days, as he nipped at her neck, hard enough to draw blood and she cried out his name in the back seat of his beat-up ( _fixer-upper_ , he called it) Chrysler and he smiled – smirked – as she said it, whispered sweet nothings into her ear. He didn't say the words himself until weeks later, after she caught him with his hand up another girl's shirt ( _flirting_ , he called it).

With Mickey, it was a matter of months, after he had taken her out (again) to the pub, surprised her with (another) bouquet of gas station roses ( _happy three-month anniversary, babe_ ), leaned in for a quick, chaste kiss (just like all the others) as the words spilled from her lips. He had beamed – a real, genuine smile so unlike Jimmy's – quick to reciprocate the pronouncement, and when she woke in the morning, his arm curled around her waist, feeling more warm and content than she had in a long time, she almost felt convinced that she hadn't been trying to convince herself when she said it.

Rose doesn't need convincing this time. It has been an undisputed fact since that first night he took her hand and said _run_ then, in the same breath, _well done_ when she explained her moving-mannequins-are-students theory (the only possible, rational explanation at the time) even though they weren't.

No, what Rose needs is control. Because even when she knows she shouldn't – that doing so would be a mistake of gargantuan proportions, that it would only add another level of complication to an already-complicated relationship, that Time Lords might not even _have_ those types of feelings (sexual or otherwise) and besides, they're fine as they are, _just fine_ – every passing day erodes at her solid, rational reasoning. Of course, it isn't entirely her fault. The touching, initially tentative, is now near-constant, long-fingered hands flitting over her body in a caress, a hug, a cuddle and when they part from a long embrace and he tips her chin up to smile at her, sometimes pressing a quick kiss to her nose . . . well, it's enough to drive anyone insane. (Rose is just surprised she hasn't been already, though sticking it out this long – logical reasoning be damned – may well be a symptom.)

He even sleeps with her now – in the purely literal sense – on the nights that he does sleep (and some of the nights that he doesn't, more than once she has caught a blurry glimpse of him tiptoeing in, book in hand, to settle in next to her). Rose doesn't know when it began and isn't inclined to argue, not when waking to those long fingers skating up and down her back and his breath tickling her ear as he babbles on about the fantastic, brilliant, _molto bene planet I am taking you to today, Rose Tyler_ , – one whose inhabitants communicate solely through song or where humanoid dogs (with noses) are the dominant form of life – has become a regular occurrence.

Regular enough that, when he wakes before her – undoubtedly to find something more intellectually stimulating than a sleeping human – it leaves his side of the bed feeling conspicuously empty and Rose far colder than the absence warrants.

There's no way she's getting back to sleep now, and really no point in sleeping in anyway without someone to sleep in _with_. Besides, the scent of pancakes is wafting down the hall and if that's not a good reason for waking up (only to go to sleep again after a stack), she doesn't know what is. Brushing her hair out of her eyes and sliding her feet into a pair of the Doctor's worn slippers (too large for her and the backs flop against the floor as she walks, but they're warmer than any of her own).

It doesn't look like he's had any problems finding the correct kitchen implements this time, but is standing at the stove in his pinstriped pajamas, humming to himself (a tune they sang karaoke to a few weeks ago, she knows he enjoyed it despite his moaning), and flips one of the pancakes with a triumphant _hah_.

Rose laughs and he turns to face her, goofy grin firmly in place. He opens his arms, bouncing slightly on the balls of his feet and Rose rushes to return the embrace, nuzzling her face into his chest as he buries his own in her hair.

_Sleep well?_ He murmurs the words into her hair, voice so soft and tender that Rose almost doesn't hear him at first.

"Pretty good." Absentmindedly, she plays with one of the buttons on his pajamas, slips it through the buttonhole to reveal a sparse patch of hair; he doesn't complain. "You?"

_Oh . . . a few hours. Best I could with your snoring._ She feels the laugh rumble up from his chest and reaches down to poke him in the ribs. _Oi!_

"You're one to talk, Time Lord."

Lies, Rose Tyler, all lies. He _tsk_ -s at her, tipping her head up to nudge her nose playfully with his own, smiling that damn smile so that her breath catches and, when his arms around her tighten for just a second, wonders if she imagines him do the same.

She doesn't let her hopes rise, not this time, knows he will push her away like he always does – ostensibly to flip a pancake, both sides now a crispy golden-brown, onto the growing stack – knows that he will make some remark about how he won a gold medal for his pancake-flipping skills on the planet of Spatularamalaqua (or some other planet with just as many syllables), and _that's_ saying something because the people of Spatularamalaqua are all descended from Gordon Ramsay. And Rose knows that she will play along like she always does – that wide grin beckons her to – knows she will make a comment about inbreeding and how it must affect the judging process because that only looked like an eight out of ten to her.

Rose barely even feels the sting of disappointment this time; two years and she has finally begun to inure herself against it. She wonders if there will ever come a day where she will cease to feel it, when she will have grown so used to what they are – the Doctor and Rose Tyler, who touch at every possible opportunity and have a Disney movie marathon with Sunday morning pancakes – that she won't even remember what they might have become – theDoctorandRoseTyler, who sleep in on Sundays (in more than the purely literal sense) and send cheesy Christmas cards every year – and, selfishly, prays that there won't.

Even knowing that this is what they are, what they will always be – that the Doctor will never be the man who flips another pancake (an eight point three out of ten this time) and leans in to brush a kiss across her lips, as casually as if he's been doing it for years, that she will never be the woman who stands on tiptoe, clutching at his shoulders, to kiss him back – she can't let go of that last little bit of hope.

Gently, he pulls away and, from the way he is smiling, Rose knows she is about to be let down just as gently, to be told that this was a mistake ( _I'm sorry, so sorry_ ) and does she want chocolate-chips or bananas in her pancakes? Besides, it was only out of instinct that she kissed him back (never mind about what he was doing kissing her in the first place – he was owed one after Cassandra) and, really, it's no big deal, and if he doesn't mind she's going to take a shower (a cold one) before the pancakes get cold. . . .

_Rose. . . ._ The Doctor chuckles, presses his lips to hers again – a long, lingering kiss that banishes all doubt and leaves Rose breathless and the Doctor beaming (damn respiratory bypass) as he leans down to whisper in her ear.

_I love you, Rose Tyler._

And suddenly the universe, that whole entirety of space and time, feels so much simpler, shrunk down to this little space of time where it is an undisputed fact that the Doctor loves Rose Tyler and he knows (oh, he knows) but she says it anyway – _I love you, Doctor_ – savoring those sweet, simultaneous feelings of release and relief. She wishes she could tell him how much it means to her, not just the sentiment, but for finally – _finally_ – not having to be the first, not having to worry about whether she is good enough, whether this, their increasingly domestic life, is good enough or if he's just saying it back because she's Rose Tyler and he can never tell her _no_.

It's silly, she knows, something his previous regeneration might have laughed at in his more callous moments; he would say he's told her before, the same three words in so many more. He would say that those three little words are just something humans came up with to mean something when they can mean everything and nothing, depending on the two parties involved. He was always doing that, boiling things down to the cold, hard facts.

But to this him, this so much more silly and emotional and human him, it means everything: everything that has already been said, everything that will be said, be it in the throes of passion or on lazy Sunday morning or sprinting away from a horde of angry aliens. It means _Rose Tyler, what would I do without you_. It means _you are more than good enough; in fact, you are the best part of me, and what do you think about forever_. It means _I promise I will not regret this the next morning or the next week or the next year – and by any chance, Rose Tyler, is that shower big enough for two_?

"Better with two," says Rose and, when she suggests a detour to the bedroom first, he takes her hand in his, whispering _run_ into the shell of her ear, and she knows exactly what he means.


	15. The Mornings After

The Doctor considers himself to be well-versed in human culture – he is mistaken for one often enough that it is convenient to know the traffic laws and slang terms of the time – but has never understood the concept of the morning after.

He knows what it _is_ , certainly, has seen enough from films (and heard enough from Jack) to form a basic approximation of the term. It is the shame that so often accompanies it that baffles him – one partner sneaking out on the other in the early hours of said morning or else sharing a stilted first, last meal where neither can meet the other's eyes and one has to ask the other where they keep the cream and sugar. (In some of Rose's favorite films, these post-coital meals are always conducted in cheery little cafes, complete with chirpy waitresses and umbrellas over the tables where one always asks the other out over a cup of coffee and, after ninety minutes or so, they discover it was true love all along which only serves to confuse the Doctor still further: shouldn't the act of sex – performed in the first five minutes of these masterpieces – imply the presence of such a feeling in the first place?).

Jack would say he's being naïve – has in fact, told him so ( _it's just sex, Doc_ ), the few times he has remarked, tone dripping with sarcasm, on Jack's return to the TARDIS in the early hours of the morning and will they ever meet the alluring creature (woman, man, or a bit of both) who kept the fine Captain out so late – while Rose would tell him he's being high-minded – he has heard enough of her previous relationships to realize that love wasn't always an option and has always tried his best to keep his (constructive) criticism of these escapist films to himself – but it isn't the rationale he has trouble understanding. The Doctor isn't inexperienced by any means and realizes the allure of having someone warm to share one's bed with, if only just for the night; and by all accounts, so does she. What he cannot wrap his mind around is the shame that inevitably follows: when he hands her a morning cuppa – he can locate the cream and sugar in every kitchen except his own, that is a job he has long ago delegated to Rose – with a friendly greeting of _hello_ or _morning_ and she takes it, unable to meet his eyes, to face up to their nightly escapades in the light of day. (This last wounds him slightly, he likes to think he was a good-looking man in all of his regenerations, if slightly lacking in fashion sense.) As if it has to be more than just sex in the light of day – complete with cheery little cafes and second dates – if he doesn’t leave right now (and she really is sorry about this, there's just a doctor's appointment or a work meeting that _can’t_ be rescheduled and sure, he understands) then it will all become too awkward to bear. And the Doctor is chivvied toward the door never given time to explain: that he didn't expect anything more, that this was just good, not-so-clean fun and I hope you find someone who you won't mind going to that little cafe with someday soon.

Someone for whom it is about more just one fun night, but a whole string of them, someone whose very self he has long ago committed to memory, branding his hearts, his mind, his entire self with her favorite color (pink) and ice cream (Rocky Road); the worst haircut ever (she tried to cut her own hair for school picture day, he tries to tell her it's not that bad but his twitching lips give him away) and the mean teacher she had in primary school (Mrs. Ruggiero, who always answered I don't know, can you? when she asked to go the bathroom); the way she arches into him when he does _that_ thing with his tongue ( _I_ knew _you'd be good at this_ ) and the sound she makes when she comes (enough to send him toppling over the edge, nails digging into her shoulders, leaving scratches that he will apologize for later, even when she tells him it doesn't matter and drags him down for another kiss).

Truth be told, the Doctor is proud of his handiwork. Dressed in one of his button-ups (half unbuttoned), the various love bites he has left are displayed to their full glory, marking her wholly as his. Forking up a bite of syrupy banana pancake to feed to her – fuel for their next session – he leans in to nibble at her earlobe and she laughs, batting him away.

_Hold on, Doctor. Give me a minute to catch my breath, yeah?_

But when he puckers his lips, giving her his best puppy-dog eyes, she kisses him anyway.

“Mmm, my favorite flavor.”

_Yeah?_

He smirks, waggling his eyebrows. “Of course. How many times have I told you, Rose? Bananas are good.”

_Shut up._ Playfully, she slaps at his arm and, ever the dramatist, he collapses in pain, wrapping his uninjured limb possessively round her waist to drag her down to the mattress with him. Deftly undoing the last few buttons, the Doctor's hands skate down her body, touch light as air despite his heavy, heated gaze.

“Oh, you are in for it now, Rose Tyler.”

It is all disgustingly, sickeningly sweet – the type of love that is only acceptable when the judge is one part of that disgustingly, sickeningly sweet whole – and the Doctor can still barely believe that it is all really happening: that it really is Rose Tyler making these altogether brilliant noises as he trails kisses down her neck, that he really is the one whispering sweet nothings into her ear. (No, not sweet nothings, sweet _somethings_ , all the sweeter for these words, words he thought he would never say, finally being realized.)

The Doctor is well-aware that he is being ridiculous, that these twitterpated looks and long, sweet kisses and hours upon hours spent in bed are not something Time Lords do. If she were anyone else – another woman to warm his bed for the night and be gone in the morning – if _he_ were anyone else – another pretty-boy boyfriend to take on-board – he wouldn't be.

But with Rose, it's different.

With Rose, it is all of it – the fun and the love, the danger and the running, hand-in-hand because he can no longer imagine any other way. With Rose, he wants all of it, no matter how unorthodox it is. He wants the pointless fights over who used the last of the milk or whose turn it is to clean the bathroom (and the makeup sex after). He wants the late-night discussions of terrible sci-fi shows or which Hogwarts house they would be Sorted into over a pint of ice cream (Rocky Road for her, banana split for him) and snuggling up to each other after, still giggling over cheesy CGI. He wants the crazy human things that used to never make sense – the Christmas tree and the white wedding and maybe even kids someday (if she wants, if they can) – not because she suddenly makes everything make sense, but because he is willing to take _her_ hand this time and run into that great unknown.

The Doctor wants to put it all down, to preserve these memories within candid photographs and cheesy home videos and let no moment – moments they can only live once – go unrecognized for the brilliant bit of life that it encompasses, as if that will immortalize the woman, his pink-and-yellow woman, with her bright blonde hair and sparkling eyes, beaming brightly at the camera.

He wants to enjoy all the mornings after that he can.


	16. The Honeymoon Phase

For Rose, it has become all about before and after.

Before, she would be woken in the mornings by his babbling as he pulled her out of bed because _morning is a relative term, Rose Tyler_ to shove a book into her face which, she later learned, held a fascinating fact about Tibetan turnips or Barcelonian dogs. A few months – and a few dozen thrown pillows – later, he learned to rein in his excitement, but more often than not she would wake to him sitting by her bedside, foot beating out a staccato rhythm and eyes dancing with excitement. More conspicuous than anything, later, was his absence when Rose would turn to nuzzle into his chest and meet cool sheets instead.

After, it is sloppy kisses and morning breath and clothing (if there is any at all) left in a pile on the floor as he welcomes her back to the world after an _unendurable_ seven hours of shuteye. Some nights he joins her in sleep and the mornings he swims up from it with her, hair mussed and eyes heavy-lidded, are her favorite. She giggles when he yawns against her lips and asks if she is boring him, heart swelling when he murmurs back _never_.

Before, their nights were spent curled up in the library or the cinema room or, on rare occasions, Rose's bedroom, touching all they could get away with and pretending they weren't. It was perfectly platonic for the Doctor to wrap an arm around her during the scary parts of the movie (thinking he was so smooth the whole time, even when it was Rose's idea to watch the sequel) or to brush a hand across her arm every time he flipped a page of that night's reading material till Rose, tired of his teasing, snuggled into his chest – ostensibly to read along with him – grasping one side of the book while the Doctor held the other, his remaining arm squeezing her closer still. This was what all best mates did. But when he bent to press a chaste goodnight kiss to her temple, Rose could feel him smiling and it made her feel she wasn't so alone after all when every touch sent some illicit thrill coursing through her veins.

After, the thrill does not diminish in the slightest; can, in fact, be said to increase. The feeling of freedom provides a better high than any _forbidden fruit_ taboo ever could and their nights are spent wrapped up in each other – either of their bedrooms or the cinema room or the library, it's their TARDIS and the only people who could have told them no are themselves – filled with moans of _Doctor_ and _Rose, Rassilon . . . Rose_ and sweet nothings whispered in the late hours of the night or early hours of the morning or any hours in between because time is, after all, _relative, Rose Tyler_. She parrots this back at him when he wheedles for a few minutes' more sleep and he pouts (so that she just _has_ to nibble on that lower lip), muttering that she's the one who tired him out in the first place and such an insatiable minx ought to be taught a lesson. Which she promptly was, fifteen minutes later.

Before, Rose was fairly sure the Doctor would do anything she asked of him.

After, she is certain.

It's a strange feeling, holding that much sway over someone, almost intoxicating. But to know that she could ask him for the universe and his only question would be what color gift-wrapping she wanted frightens her, too, and it is not a power she uses often.

In all honesty, it was hardly necessary to begin with. She loves this life with its strange planets and even stranger aliens and plots – some by aliens and some by good, old-fashioned humans – to destroy the universe. She loved the strangeness, but the loved the beauty of it, too – this whole, wide universe filled with beings, no matter how strange, living out their lives day after day. A teenage couple – who appeared to be a humanoid-fish cross – walking down the street hand-in-hand; a group of children playing catch with a hedgehog-type creature who later scurried down the street after them like a faithful dog; a harried-looking waitress balancing a half-dozen platters in as many arms and Rose rushed to help when one fell to the floor, splattering several patrons in blue-colored goop.

Granted, some of this _connection_ came from superfluous trips to spas or shopping malls, but it was nice to rest her feet once in a while and, when she pulled the Rose Tyler Puppy-Dog Look, the protesting Doctor was more than happy to oblige. Besides, it wasn’t like she hadn’t caught him flirting with the cute nail technician – which he obliviously referred to as _just talking, Rose_ \- an effect somewhat muted by his giggling every time her fingers brushed over the soles of his super-sensitive Time Lord feet.

Intentional or not, the flirting stops after, as do the dastardly people and dangerous planets and still-more-dastardly-and-dangerous plots. Intent on proving that he is just as good a _boyfriend_  (she teases him with the term once and is surprised when he looks thoughtful, not as if the word is anathema to him but as if he is considering it for future use) as any human bloke, the hours between those passion-filled mornings and nights are filled with picnic lunches on apple grass hillsides and swan boat rides down multicolored rivers and late-night movies at actual movie theaters where they share a tub of popcorn and start making out halfway through. The worst danger they face is overly ambitious security guards, penlights illuminating their affronted expressions as they work their way through the aisles, and the Doctor grabs her hand, whispering _run_ as they bound into the night, laughing like loons.

Rose smiles back at the shopkeeper setting up his wares and the old woman feeding the birds and the little girl who stares so unabashedly that her mother has to pull her away, all these people whose knowing glances she would always avoid before, trying her best to concentrate on the Doctor's babbling till they cleared the sea of curious onlookers. For once, it is the beauty of their normalcy being celebrated, and Rose can't remember ever feeling so happy.

But one week stretches into two and then into three and four. Despite herself, Rose grows bored.

“Hey, Doctor.” She trails a hand down his chest and he shivers, eyes drifting shut.

_Hmm?_

“Today – why don't we go visit that planet . . . oh, what's it called – Mandibla?”

Mandibila, he corrects, pulling her closer and tugging at the hem of her top. _Why?_

“Dunno . . . just thought the twenty-fourth century might be interesting.” She spreads her legs, allowing him to snake one of his own between them.

_When there was a civil war on?_ Sleep and arousal clouding his mind in equal measure, the Doctor still manages to sound suspicious, sending her a shrewd look from beneath his heavy lids.

“Was there? Huh. . . . How 'bout that planet – oh, I can't remember the name – but they held that really nice ball we went to a couple months back?” She tips her head upward to capture his lips. “You know, the one where I wore that red dress?” She trails kisses down his neck. “Where you couldn't take your eyes off me?”

_The one where half the attendees were poisoned and I had to rush you back to the infirmary to give you the antidote?_

“Well,” Rose attempts a winning smile, resisting the urge to tug at her ear, a nervous tic she has developed thanks to him, “when you say it that way, you make it sound so bad.”

_Mmm. Life-threatening events tend to do that. S'pose that dress was rather sexy, though. . . ._

“With the slit up to here.” Rose moves his hand to her upper thigh, gasping when he moves it further up her leg, snagging the top of her underwear with one deft finger and tugging them down.

_I remember._

“I caught you sneaking glances, Mister.”

_Not going to deny it._ The Doctor smirks, wriggling to divest himself of his own pants.

“And you got so jealous when that alien prince asked me to dance.”

That I did. When he climbs atop her, Rose thrusts her hips upward to meet him. _Still. Mine now._

“Yours,” Rose assures him before surrendering herself entirely to the undeniable feeling of release that ends with her, quivering and incoherent, hands fisted in his hair before he uncurls her fingers, one by one, and disappears to pilot them to that day's destination.

**. . .**

“You planned this, didn't you?” she asks, several hours later, standing up and brushing sand off the backs of her thighs.

_Maaaaybe._ Eager to help in the sand-ridding process, the Doctor brushes a hand down her spine, grinning when she shivers, stopping at the small of her back and using it to guide her forward to the water's edge. She sighs at the cool sand under her toes and he chuckles. _Besides, I thought you'd like it._

Unwilling to argue the point in such a sated state, Rose reaches out to run a reassuring hand across his cheek. “I did. I do. Just. . . .” She pauses, hand extended in mid-air, face pensive.

_What?_

“Nothing. Some bad dejá-vu, that's all.”

_Oh?_ Brow furrowed, he raises his hand to take hers bringing their entwined fingers, together, to his cheek. The touch reassures her.

“Yeah. Feels like . . . you're gonna think this is mental.”

_Rose, I'm a Time Lord. Mental comes with the job description._ He sighs when she remains silent. _Just tell me._

“This whole thing just feels . . . familiar. Like I've been here before. Like you and I've been here before. . . . We haven't, have we?”

The Doctor shakes his head, hand tightening around hers when her breath catches. But it's not entirely unheard of, either. _There are millions of parallel universes out there, Rose. There are millions of Doctors and Roses out there_ – he squeezes her hand again – _and they find each other in every, single one. It wouldn't surprise me if one of those parallel us-es thought a trip to the beach sounded good, too._

“But it doesn't feel good,” Rose insists. “Doctor, it doesn't feel _right_. It's . . . I think something bad happens here. Something terrible.”

_Well, then._ He presses his lips to her palm in a soft kiss. _We'll just have to make some good memories to make up for it, now won't we? Just look at that sunset._ Releasing her hand, he wraps his arms fully around her, nodding toward the horizon.

“Bit early for it, isn't it?” Rose tilts her wrist, searching for a nonexistent watch. “What time is it, anyway?” She turns in his arms to find him steadfastly avoiding her gaze.

_Ehm. . . ._

“Doctor?” She turns from him back to the setting sun, setting the sky around it afire with oranges, pinks, and yellows. “Doctor, what is that?”

_Er . . . well, the Heliosians might be trying to burn up the sun and destroy the world as we know it. They're a race of sun-worshipers and believe that the people of this universe haven't been paying it the proper reverence._

“Right. And we're here because. . . ?”

He runs a hand through his hair, looking sheepish. _Um . . . I looked into it and saw that it was us. We were the ones that stopped it and . . . well, you seemed like – I mean, this morning . . . and I thought you'd like. . . . But now, with you and_ – with one hand, he makes a wide, sweeping gesture around the beach – _it doesn't matter, we can always come back another time, Rose. Not here-here, I don't want to upset the timelines any more than necessary, but if you're upset, then. . . ._

Rose cuts him off with a kiss. “God, I love you.”

_Quite right, too._  Returning to the TARDIS only long enough to throw an overcoat on over his swim trunks and toss her a jacket, they tear off down the beach, hand-in-hand and no plan in mind.

A quake shakes the ground and Rose spots smoke winding up into the sky, appearing to come from the sun itself, but when Rose turns to the Doctor, he is grinning as widely as her. And suddenly, it is before again: the Doctor and Rose Tyler, the stuff of legend, saving the world just as they should be.

Just like before, but with one small difference.

“I missed this.”

He skids to a stop, gathering her lips in a deep kiss. _Me too._


	17. The Honeymoon's Wane

The Doctor doesn't sleep the night he is relegated to the couch. Though it grows steadily more difficult as the witching hours tick on toward morning, he holds his eyes stubbornly open, staring at the locked bedroom door – a silent rebellion.

It’s been a week since he's last slept. More importantly, _Rose_ knows it has been a week since he's last slept. (They are, after all, the ones keeping each other awake.) If he weren’t so angry, he would have admired her cunning.

Out of the wide variety of punishments in her arsenal, she knows he will hate this most of all: conforming to the stereotype of the henpecked, all-too-human husband. A fitful night's sleep on the sofa – thin blanket pulled up to his chin, head pillowed miserably on one arm – all too ready to accept any reprieve his wife will offer. The TARDIS has gone so far as to supply the worn blanket and stock all the pillows away in a locked cupboard. She doesn’t even attempt to hide her satisfied hum when the Doctor tugs fruitlessly at the sonic-immune handle.

Unsurprising though it may be – she takes Rose’s side in everything these days – the Doctor can’t help but feel betrayed. It’s his ship, after all. She’s the one who’s been making things so damned domestic the past few months.

_Months?_ The Doctor snorts at his own naïveté. Try the past few years.

Ever since that first day, after Cardiff and Christmas and Charles Dickens, while he sat tinkering in the console room and she had strolled in, two mugs of tea in her hands. She thrust one towards him and the sonic rolled under the control panel in his haste to grab it and prevent the hot liquid from spreading across the grating.

“What’s this?”

_What’s it look like?_ She grinned, tongue poking out from between her teeth, as if knowing, even then, what that look did to him.

Still scrabbling for his sonic underneath the console he didn’t reply and she continued on, undeterred. _I thought you could use a cuppa is all. I know I always like one after a long day and . . . well, I don’t know how you take it, but there’s two sugars and a bit of milk._

He had taken a sip, more to quiet her than anything. (She talked more than him in those days, perched on the jump seat, spouting questions about anything and everything.) It was slightly sweeter than the old him had liked but he didn’t say a word, only smiled and thanked her. She smiled back and, gathering up the skirts of her period-era dress (the first of many to fuel his fantasies), settled in for a long night’s conversation – the first of many.

Thousands of different scenarios play out in his mind – waving her away with an indistinct grumble about jiggery-pokery or retreating into the bowels of the TARDIS (still firmly his ally at the time) the moment he sensed her approach – none of which ended with their shared meal of tea and banana biscuits. If only it had been so simple. If only her tongue-touched grin and sparkling brown eyes and bottle-blonde hair hadn’t ensnared him, so completely. He couldn’t deny her a thing if he tried.

Not that he tried too hard.

She was just so subtle – so bloody _sneaky_ – about the whole thing, that the Doctor hardly realized what was happening until he was being suffocated by the sheer weight of it all. Sit-down meals and movie nights with a bowl of popcorn resting on his lap; joint trips to grocery stores and shopping malls where she found him a banana-patterned tie, so bright it hurt the eyes; a second signature added to Christmas and birthday cards, sent to her mum and Shareen every year.

And the next thing he knew, there was Rose Tyler, spread seductively across the shared bed of their shared bedroom, dressed in a filmy red negligee she had no doubt purchased with their shared credit stick.

It had all seemed so innocent, something any Time Lord would do with their traveling companion – if said traveling companion was pretty and blonde and had a way of look at him that made him want to do anything and everything she pleased.

Including remembering what day it was.

The Doctor glared at the door, still firmly shut. It wasn't like she even _liked_ Valentine's Day, she'd told him so within a few months of meeting her, during one of their long chats in the console room. She had been picking at a flower that a pretty, fifty-first century diplomat had given to her, citing the hackneyed line _a rose for a rose_. Petals fell carelessly from her fingers to land on the floor and the Doctor grumbled at her to clean up after her boyfriend.

_He's not my boyfriend._

“What'll Adam think, eh? You sure do pick them pretty, Rose.”

She tore viciously at the flower, pricking her finger on a thorn and hissing in pain. _I don't even like roses. Everyone thinks I do, but I don't._

“Oh?”

Yeah. Rose shrugged, eyes on the pile of petals at her feet. _None of that romance-y stuff's really my thing, I guess._

“Oh.”

_I'll go make tea._ Destroyed flower in hand, Rose left the room, leaving the Doctor to wonder if he had imagined the tinge of pink to her cheeks.

It was the same shade she had turned back in the bedroom, clambering out of bed and nearly tripping over one of the candles she had lit, burning the very tips of her toes.

He chuckles, reaching forward to steady her. “Careful there.”

_I'm fine._ She rights herself, glaring fiercely. _Don't touch me._

“Hey, hey. . . . What's wrong?” While part of the Doctor's mind registers he is in some sort of trouble, the other is more fixated on the fact that Rose is half-naked and there is a very, very inviting bed nearby.

_You can't tell me you don't know._ Rose crosses her arms across her chest, impeding his view.

“But I _don't_ know! It’s not like I was expecting. . . . Not that I’m complaining,” he adds hastily, waggling his eyebrows, a feeble attempt to alleviate her deepening glare.

_You really don’t know. That humongous Time Lord brain and you haven’t got a clue._

The Doctor sighs. “Is that what you want? Fine – I’m a silly, stupid Time Lord who can barely even pilot his own ship. Remember when I dropped you off a year late? Oh! – or,” he develops a Scottish brogue, “when I missed the mark by a century and we ended up meeting that werewolf. Ooh, and Queen Victoria – can’t forget her. _We are not_. . . .”

_That is not what I want!_ Looking very unamused herself, Rose snags her dressing gown from the foot of the bed and throws it on, tugging it shut. Something approaching a whimper comes from the back of the Doctor’s throat.

“Wait . . . wait. . . . It’s not one of those little anniversaries, is it? Like the, oh, I dunno,” the Doctor racks his brain, riffling through a mental catalogue of names and dates, “the first time I took you to get chips?”

Rose marches past him to the door, throwing it open. _Get out._

“Our trip to New Earth, then?” He approaches her slowly, hand extended placatingly. “Lying in the applegrass? The hospital with that little shop – no, it didn't have a shop, did it? And I said they should put one in. Remember?” He grins, confident in his answer.

_Doctor. Out._

“Rose, you're being ridiculous.” The Doctor sighs, irritation getting the better of him. “So I can't remember one day. There'll be a million others. And I'm sure,” his eyes darken, “we can find some other way to make tonight special.”

She shoves him, hard, sending him reeling into the hall.

“Come on, if you want me to guess so bad, at least give me a hint! Rose!”

For a moment, he thinks she won't answer him. Then, as if she can't stop herself, _February fourteenth good enough for ya?_

Shite.

“Time’s relative!” he shouts back through the door.

This time, the silence remains.

She can’t honestly have expected him to remember. As though he has the time to keep track of Rose’s personal calendar – let alone the one day a year when his love for her corresponds to the number of romantic trinkets he showers her with – when he’s saving the known (and unknown) universes every other day. She knew what she was getting into. He’d made it abundantly clear from the start: he doesn’t do domestics.

Except for that first night when she made him tea and he grumbled but didn’t say no.

Except for last night when, post-coitus, he suggested they watch _Lion King_ and she rolled her eyes but agreed anyway.

Except for every night and day in between when he didn't say no and she didn't say no and he relished her every touch – her fingers intertwining with his, her head leaning on his shoulder, her lips brushing across his cheek – constantly craving more, till it was finally granted him and he loved it - loved _her_ – all the more for that.

With that precedent, could he really blame her for being the tiniest bit irrational? For believing that maybe, with her, February fourteenth would be – maybe not fantastic – but at least alright?

_Evening, stranger._ She leaned casually on one arm, peering up at him through her lashes as he'd pushed open the bedroom door.

“What's all this, then?” the Doctor asked, fingers already working at the buttons of his suit-jacket, eyes widening as she clambered out of bed, cheeks as bright as her nightie.

There had been no mention of flowers or chocolates, no hints, subtle or otherwise, about a romantic night on the town. No, tonight had been about a romantic night in, a holiday that was a celebration of the Doctor and Rose Tyler. All she had expected in return was a validation, a confirmation that yes, this might be a silly human holiday but he would do it anyway because with Rose – with Rose, it meant something more than boxes of chocolates or bouquets of flowers or pastel-colored teddy bears and matching candy hearts.

With Rose, it meant love.

Feeling a thorough arse, the Doctor grabs the provided blanket from the arm of the couch, lies down and tugs it over himself, pillowing his head miserably on one arm. His eyes fall shut almost immediately. If he can't give her Valentine's Day, at least he can give her this.

Dimly, there sounds the creak of an opening door, tentative footsteps across the hall, invading his fading consciousness; the Doctor tenses, but doesn't turn from his position facing the back of the couch. She perches on the far arm of the couch and he wiggles his toes in her direction, nudging her thigh; she pokes him back, a finger to his pants-legged calf that creeps slowly upward.

_I'm sorry._

“Don't be.”

_I overreacted._

“ _I_ overreacted.”

_I don't even_ like _Valentine's Day._

“I thought not.”

_Yeah._  He hears her lips curve into the tiniest of smiles. _Ridiculous, I know. You were right. I just . . . I never had – not with Jimmy or Mickey. . . . So I thought. . . ._

“It was brilliant – _you_ were brilliant.” He props himself up one arm, the other reaching out to stroke her cheek. “ _Are_ brilliant,” he amends, grinning when she flushes again.

_I shouldn't have expected you to remember._

“I should have remembered.”

_God._ She shakes her head. _Can't you just let me apologize?_

“Nope.”

_So. . . ._

“So?”

_Are_ you _going to apologize, then?_

“If you want.”

_You're such an arse._ She pokes him again, harder this time.

“Yep,” he says, popping the _p_.

Rose frowns for a second, eyes narrowed in thought, before her expression changes, twisting into a mock-scowl. Splaying one hand on the back of the couch, she moves toward him, dressing gown falling open to afford him another glimpse of red lace.

_I'm still angry with you a bit, you know._

“Yeah?” His grin widens.

_Yes._

“What a coincidence, Rose Tyler.” He pulls her atop him, nipping at her jaw and pretending to glare. “Because I'm still a bit angry with you as well.”

_Yeah?_

He tears her dressing gown off in one, rough move as she starts on his half-unbuttoned shirt. “Yes.”


	18. Birthdays (His)

In retrospect, Rose isn't sure whether to be proud or ashamed of her duplicity.

It isn't much – it's a bit pathetic, actually, for someone who professes to be the Doctor’s best mate – but it's the best she can do. Tricking an ancient time-and-space-traveling alien is by no means easy, and Rose doesn't understand why anyone even bothers to try anymore. Whatever form of communication megalomaniacs bent on universal domination use, the whole _don't mess with the Doctor_ bit must have gotten lost in translation.

Even Rose – again claiming the title of the Doctor's Best Mate and all its' associated glory – was forced to employ the most devious diversionary techniques at her disposal. He thought he was so sneaky about the whole thing, but she noticed the way his eyes softened, crinkling at the corners, when she gave him an excited, tongue-in-teeth grin or tucked her hair behind her ears, leaning forward to listen to him expound on another wonder of the universe. He was held captive by her own captivation, and Rose was not above pressing her advantage.

Granted, he was still a bit grumpy about the unplanned visit to her mum's – _can't it wait till next week_ , when _next week_ could very well encompass any period of time and _time is relative was not an excuse when I haven't seen her in ages, Doctor_ and Rose bit her lip just so – but it's not like he'd given her much choice in the matter. He was the epitome of a double-standard: quizzing her incessantly about the trivialities of her day-to-day life, but clamming up instantly if she so much as asked his favorite color.

“It's blue,” she said one morning over tea and toast, nodding toward his mug.

_Yes,_ he gave her an odd look, holding up the cup for inspection, _it is._

“You always choose that mug,” she noted. “You're wearing a blue jumper, too. And the TARDIS is blue.”

_Yes,_ he repeated slowly, cautiously. _Are you feeling alright, Rose?_

“That's your favorite color, isn't it? Blue?” Her face split open in a wide grin as he scoffed. “It is, isn't it? Ha!”

The Doctor frowned at her, lower lip pooching out in a pout, strangely incongruous against his leather jacket and close-cropped hair. _For your information, Rose Tyler, this jumper isn’t blue, it’s a – a light black._

“Liar, liar,” she teased.

_I don't lie, Rose Tyler._ And, as she made to protest, _Not to you._

His tone indicated an end to the blue/not-blue discussion, and Rose didn't argue. Still, it didn't stop her from secreting as many blue decorations as she could carry – bought from the supermarket down the street from her mum's – back to her room. The Doctor didn't even glance up when she returned, only grunted in greeting, eyes fixed on the bit of the TARDIS he was tinkering with; balancing three bulging bags in the crook of one arm, Rose found herself grateful for his gruffness.

Rose counts herself lucky that the TARDIS decided to act up – what the Doctor affectionately refers to as _pitching a fit_ – sending him jetting off to the console room halfway through breakfast, cuppa in one hand and a half-eaten slice of toast in the other, too immersed in his work to notice her absence or, far more appealing, the scent of bananas wafting from the kitchen.

Now all she has to do is wait, to sit here amongst the balloons and streamers and homemade chips that are only a bit burnt, to blow on a kazoo when he enters the room and present him with a cake – chocolate, with blue banana frosting – entreating him to _make a wish, Doctor, go on_ , beaming broadly all the while. Because if she just grins widely enough or laughs loudly enough, she won’t notice how his confused expression is rapidly changing to one of disgust. How could it be anything but when he sees the silly cone hats, the helium balloons – a few read _Happy Birthday_ , others a cringe-worthy _Over the Hill_ – the candles forming a crooked infinity symbol on the cake and Rose will shrug helplessly and grin so wide that she feels her face might split in two.

“I didn’t know how old you were.”

It will be all she can say, a confession of and apology for, her inadequacy, all in one.

She knows which knock-off soccer jersey to get Mickey, what pair of shoes Shareen has been lusting after – but all she can give the Doctor, the man who has given her the universe, is the color blue.

He may indulge her for a little while, have a sliver of cake, a handful of chips, may even thank her. She’s only human, after all, and has fragile feelings that must be respected. But when he smiles his eyes won’t crinkle at the corners; it will be the same smile, the same _thank you_ her mum gave her when she made a macaroni picture frame in kindergarten.

She should throw the whole lot out right now, save them both the embarrassment. The TARDIS will have him tinkering for at least another half-hour – more if she asks nicely – plenty of time for her to clean up. At least she can save the cake – the candles can be removed without too much mess. It may still be domestic, but a good deal less so than having a party for a man who, if he hasn’t forgotten altogether, has long stopped caring about turning another year older. Standing on tiptoe, she peels a streamer away from the top of a coral strut.

_What’s this?_

“Nothing.” Rose starts at the unexpected voice; cheeks burning, she fiddles with the dangling streamer, refusing to face his skeptical expression and twitching lips – a combination of amusement and exasperation as he takes in what the silly little human has done now.

_Doesn’t look like nothing._

“Well, it is.”

_I see._ A pause, while he suppresses a laugh. _And in your myriad experience, Rose Tyler,_ nothing _involves streamers and balloons?_

“Yes.” Defiantly, she meets his gaze, blinking away the burning behind her eyes.

_I see._ He pauses again, mouth twisting in deliberation. _Do you mind if I have a slice of cake?_

Rose shrugs, a feeble attempt at nonchalance. “It’s your TARDIS.”

_But it’s your cake._ The Doctor grabs a pair of paper plates – decorated with cartoon balloons and confetti - from the table, passing one to her. Instinctively, Rose’s fingers curl around it. _I could smell it all the way from the console room. Banana?_

“Wha– oh, yeah. Yes.”

_Thought so. Great nose, me._ Tipping a thick slice of cake onto one of the plates, he taps said appendage with a frosting-covered finger. _Great all-around senses, really – nose, eyes, ears._ He tugs at one, and from the glance he shoots her way, Rose knows it is her turn to play along. It is his birthday, after all.

“I already knew about the ears.”

Around a large bite, the Doctor grins at her. _Good cake._

“Is it?”

_Aren’t you going to have some?_ His brow furrows in concern, and Rose looks blankly down at the plate in her hand before bringing it over to the counter. She can feel the Doctor’s eyes boring into her as she cuts a thin sliver for herself, stomach churning too fiercely to accept any more.

_That’s all?_

“I had a big breakfast.” Forcing her downturned lips into a smile, Rose takes a bite. “That _is_ good.”

_Well, that wasn’t too bright. Isn’t the whole point of human birthdays the cake and ice cream?_

She doesn’t ask how he knows; even without the decorations, her pink face is an answer in and of itself. Any attempt at denial would be an exercise in futility, like the time she had hidden her mum’s vase – broken in the process of a perfect cartwheel and what did it matter if Jackie had told her not in the house – in the hall closet and blamed it on the neighbor’s cat. The Doctor’s shrewd expression was so similar to her mother’s, it was eerie.

It disturbs Rose all the more that she was comparing the Doctor to her mum in this scenario.

“Sure, when you’re a kid.”

Isn’t that what they’re playing at, though? She stares down at her plate, swallowing thickly. That’s exactly what it is: A kid’s birthday party for a man – an alien – so much older, so much stranger, than anyone she’s ever known.

_And then what?_

“I dunno.” Rose digs the tines of her fork into the cake, twisting viciously. “Going out with mates, I guess. Getting plastered and calling in to work sick.”

_Hmm._ His mouth twists in thought again. _Do you want to do that next year?_

“No.” It is the only answer she can manage, a mixture of anger and mortification boiling in the back of her throat.

_Yeah, suppose not._ He sucks on a frosting-coated finger pensively. Not with those hangovers you lot get. _I wouldn't mind more of this cake, though._ Reaching for the serving knife, he cuts himself a second slice. _Do you. . . ?_

“No.”

_Mmm. Worth celebrating all on its own, this cake is. We'll have to remember this for next year – mark it down on that calendar of yours, would you, Rose? 'Cake Day.' Oh, his eyes scan the room, and Balloons and Streamers and . . . did you make chips? Chips Day, too._

“Can you _stop_ it?” She claps a hand to her mouth too late to prevent the words and, groaning, she covers her face with her hands.

_Rose?_ She hears him set the plate down and then hurried footsteps, crossing the kitchen to her. _Rose, what’s the matter?_

Rose wishes she could disappear. She wonders if the TARDIS has some sort of dematerializaton beam, to send every last embarrassed atom floating off into space.

_Rose?_

“Nothing. It’s nothing. Don’t worry about the silly human. Just – erm . . . have your cake, I’ve got to. . . .”

_Well, it’s obviously something,_ he says, the concern in his voice not entirely disguising the impatience. _This whole thing is obviously. . . ._

“Look,” Rose runs a distracted hand through her hair, “you know what it is. You bloody _called_ it what it is.”

  
The Doctor scoffs. _Of course I do – I’m brilliant._

“Then what's the problem?” Rose's voice catches and she takes a breath to steady herself. “Look, we both know this isn't your thing, and I know you probably think I'm some stupid ape . . .”

_Don't call yourself that._

“. . . for even thinking it could be. But can't you just tell me that? You don't have to – you know. . . stick around, eat cake -”

_I liked the cake._

“Then take the bloody thing to the console room, finish your repairs. You don't need to humor me or whatever it is you're doing.”

_Rose, I was only . . . I'm only -_ he breaks off, rubbing frustratedly at his temples. _I thought this was what you wanted._

“Yeah, well it's not.” Rose crosses her arms across her chest, refraining from stamping her foot with difficulty. “I'm not some kid.”

_I know you're not. I was only trying to. . . ._

“I know! That's all you've been trying to do since D- . . . since 1987. Taking me to all these malls and spas and – for God's sake, Doctor, you sat through _Titanic_.”

_Didn't realize you were complaining._ He scowls at her, and Rose wonders if she imagines the pinkish tint to his own cheeks.

“I'm not.”

_Sure sounds like it._

“I'm not,” she repeats vehemently, glaring right back at him and not entirely sure when this changed from a not-quite-birthday into a fight. “But Doctor, it's – it's too much. You know everything about me.”

_Oh, thanks for clearing that up, Rose. I can see why you're so mad. The nerve of me –_ knowing things _about my companion._

“It's not just things, though – it's everything.” In the face of his skeptical expression, she continues, “What did I shoplift when I was twelve?”

_Rose, this is ridiculous._

“Answer the question.”

He sighs heavily, rolling his eyes to the ceiling. _A tube of lip gloss from the Tesco's, and you felt so guilty that you took it back afterward._

“And who was my first kiss with?”

_Kenny James,_ the Doctor's jaw clenches, on the swing set in third grade. _He was a geek and everyone made fun of you for it, till Sarah King vomited during the end-of-term pizza party._

“And what's your favorite color?”

_Nice try, Rose Tyler._

“See?”

_So I'm getting in trouble for having the right answer? That's backwards even for you lot._

“ _My lot_?” Rose repeats, voice growing higher-pitched with each successive syllable. “My lot of stupid, emotionally-driven apes . . .”

_I didn't say that._

“. . . who try to throw some stupid party for their – their _stupid_ bloody best friend who's been so – so _stupidly_ nice to them, and they want to make it up to him because that's the only way us hormonal apes know how. But, you know, _my lot_ is also so effing stupid that when they start planning the stupid party, they realize they don't know one real bloody thing about their best friend, so they can't get him a present and they can't write him a card with any stupid inside jokes. All they can do is make a banana cake and get – get some stupid blue decorations, because that's the best effing thing they can come up with. And do you know how _stupid_ that makes them feel, Doctor?”

For a long moment he doesn't say a word, only reaches out to run the pad of his thumb over her cheek. Belatedly, Rose realizes that she is crying.

_You made chips._

“I didn't even know how many candles to put on,” she sniffles, unable to stop herself though the shreds of her self-preservation scream otherwise. He didn't sign on for some clingy human girl, the only reason he invited her was to have someone to back him up if he got into a jam with those megalomaniacs bent on world domination. Megalomaniacs who, despite everything, don't understand the meaning of _don't mess with the Doctor_.

Rose guesses she doesn't understand it either. She always has been thick – willing to risk it all: the end of a life among the stars, the return to a day-to-day life in the Powell Estates, and all for a chance to impart a lesson to a man who doesn't even subscribe to their ideals, whose only goal in life is to accrue all the knowledge the universe has to offer. And why should it matter what his favorite color is or how he takes his tea when this nineteen-year-old shop girl is full of so many ridiculous mysteries of domesticity to unravel?

_That was what we had after Platform One,_ says the Doctor.

“What?” Her voice comes out hoarse and she clears her throat.

_Chips,_ he repeats. _We went to that little shop you like, down the street from Henrik's._

“Yeah.”

T _hese are better, though._ He holds up a chip for inspection before popping it into his mouth. _You drowned them in vinegar last time – eugh._ He pulls a face. _Inedible._

“You . . . don't like vinegar.”

_Can't stand it,_ says the Doctor, nodding emphatically. _That, and pears. And aspirin – I'm allergic to aspirin, actually._

“Oh.”

_And just so you know,_ says the Doctor, _my favorite color is blue._

Rose's lips twitch. “Oh,” she says again.

_Thought I'd clear that up for you._ _In case you were laboring under any misapprehensions and got me, I dunno,_ pink _balloons next year._

She does, anyway, intertwining the pink with the blue and, from his goofy grin as he cuts a second slice of banana-frosted cake and plants a brief but sticky kiss to her forehead, knows that she has discovered another one of his favorite things.


	19. Birthdays (Hers)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please note that the rating has gone from Mature to Explicit for this chapter, mostly because I'm paranoid. Hope you enjoy the Doctor/Rose naughtiness either way. ;)

It is no secret that the Doctor enjoys having sex with Rose Tyler.

It is also no secret that _enjoys_ is a bit of an understatement. He does, after all, enjoy numerous things that have nothing to do with Rose Tyler’s naked body – such as cuddling with Rose Tyler or hugging Rose Tyler or tinkering with the TARDIS while Rose Tyler – dressed in a vest top and a pair of his boxer-shorts – watches from her spot on the jump seat and she looks so ridiculously beautiful just being Rose that he has to lean down and steal a kiss, smearing her face with grease so that she wrinkles her nose and grabs the lapels of his jacket to pull him down for another, deeper kiss.

That’s when they go straying into Rose Tyler’s naked body territory again.

Enjoyable though these activities are, however, the Doctor can handle being denied them for short periods of time. If they are chained on opposite sides of a prison cell, for instance, he is more concerned with picking the locks on their cuffs than pulling her into a full swing-around-and-squeeze embrace. He settles for a brief, celebratory hug instead before taking her hand and sprinting full-on for the TARDIS, a half-dozen guards at their heels who bang uselessly on the door and gape in astonishment as the big, blue box disappears in front of them. Of course, by that point they are both too wrapped up in a swing-around-and-squeeze embrace to notice and so was it really his fault that, when they returned a few months later – because he had found the perfect spot for a picnic, even better than the apple grass – the TARDIS was confiscated by those same paranoid guards?

“What happened to shoddy job performance?” says the Doctor, pressing his ear to the inside of the storage cubicle where they had accidentally locked themselves in an attempt to regain the time ship. The only way they were getting out at this point was by destroying the door – a process that was not in the least inconspicuous and which he did not need another overly-efficient guard bursting in on. “Doing just enough to get by. This lot’s way too attentive. We should check it out after we get out of here – they might be under mass mind-control.”

In the enclosed space there is barely room to move but, from the tilt of Rose’s head against his torso, he can tell she’s rolling her eyes.

_Yeah, and I’m sure being able to hear our landing clear across the city didn’t alert them at all._

The Doctor frowns down at her, twisting to pull the sonic from his pocket. “That’s the sound of the universe you’re talking about, Rose Tyler.”

She shifts against him again, this time to cross her arms huffily across her own chest. _Doesn’t make it any less loud._

“Mmm, s’pose not. But,” his voice dips lower and the hand that isn’t holding the sonic curls around her hip, “who’s to say noise is a bad thing, eh? There are many, _many_ noises that I’m quite fond of.”

_Many,_ she echoes dryly. _Didn’t realize you were so popular, Doctor._

“Oh, no, they all stem from the same woman,” he corrects, long fingers working at the fastening of her jeans. “But they are all just so subtly different. Like the noise you make when I do this,” she gasps as he dips a finger underneath her jeans and knickers in one fluid movement, “is much different than when I, say, do _this_.” His free hand moves from groin to chest, tweaking her right nipple and he beams against her neck when she moans. “And, you see, they’re all so brilliant that I wouldn’t want to leave any one out. You, Rose Tyler,” he breathes, tongue darting out to run across her earlobe, “defy categorization.”

_Doctor, there could be guards right outside._

The Doctor tilts his ear toward the locked door again. “Not yet there aren't. Either way, Rose Tyler,” he presses against her more firmly, “I can guarantee that _you_ will be coming before they do.”

Her groan this time is a mix of arousal and exasperation (number 54 on his list of Favorite Rose Tyler Noises). _That was terrible._

“I'm serious,” he teases, finger sliding back inside her, “that lot are such overachievers I bet they don't even have time for stuff like this.”

_Lo-locking themselves in storage cubicles . . . you mean?_ Rose asks, voice slightly thready, and the Doctor grins, finger continuing its' steady pumping.

“Highly underrated, storage cubicles are, Rose Tyler,” he admonishes, nipping lightly at her neck. “All the privacy and comfort of home, except – well, not.”

As it turns out, definitely not – particularly when the door is unlocked by a whole battalion of angry guards, and when Rose spots them her cry changes from one of climax to one of fear while the Doctor, so startled by the noise (not catalogued in with the rest of the Rose Tyler Noises, and why should she make a noise like _that_ when they are engaged in such pleasurable activities as _this_ ) and the sudden light in his peripheral vision, nearly drops her onto the steel cubicle floor. Half-carrying her as she struggles to pull her jeans up over her hips and he keeps them an arm's length away from the guards, the Doctor has neither the time nor the inclination to notice the glare she is shooting his way.

By the time he has the time to notice – once they have lost the guards and recovered the TARDIS and the Doctor has piloted them into the vortex safe and sound – Rose is asleep, or at least pretending to be, curled up on her side of the bed and surrounded by pillows. Knowing he isn't welcome, the Doctor retreats to the console room, tinkering for the few hours before she wakes up and he can present her with a morning cuppa – whether it's morning or not – and pray for forgiveness.

Rose calls him insatiable. The Doctor agrees.

“Good word choice, Rose Tyler.”

_It wasn’t a compliment, Doctor._ Lifting the covers, she slides into bed next to him. _You have to learn to rein in your impulses some time._

“Do I, though?” Propping his head up one arm, he turns on the pillow to face her, one side of his mouth tilting up in a crooked smile; the other hand slides downward to rest across her lower back, pulling her closer to him.

_Yes._ He smirks as she makes no move to squirm away from him. _I don’t think Mum will be as lenient next time she sees your bare bum on her sofa._

“Lenient?” the Doctor repeats incredulously. “She – Rose, she threatened to,” he lowers his voice to a whisper, eyes boring into hers, “she threatened to – to _slap my bum_. In no universe is that _lenient_ , Rose Tyler. It's not _my_ fault her shift ended early. She knows we're together, she knows what we get up to. . . .”

_Yes,_ Rose says again. _But that doesn't mean she wants it done in her living room._

“Would've had no problem moving it to the bedroom,” the Doctor grumbles, “if she had bothered to call. Three phones, _three_ – the house phone and your super phone and the TARDIS phone – and she can't call _one_ to let us know she's on her way. Would've taken her two seconds and saved us all endless pain and misery.”

Rose scoots closer, resting her head under his chin. _I don't know about misery. . . ._

“She threatened to slap my bum, Rose – _slap_ it! And you know how Jackie Tyler slaps. It's a miracle I didn't regenerate the first time. Bet that's just what you wanted, too,” he sulks, “a pretty, rude-and-not-ginger Doctor.”

_Oh, stop whining, you know she wouldn't do it._ He can feel the curve of her lips against her collarbone. _She only said it because she likes how it looks, anyway._

“What?” Starting away from Rose, the Doctor sits straight up in bed, eyes wide in affront. He runs a hand along his backside, as though to check it's still there. “She – she . . . your _mother_ . . . well, she flirted with me the first time, but that's neither here nor – and I turned her down! You call _me_ insatiable but really, it’s you Tyler women! Oh, we are going back there tomorrow and – Rose Tyler, are you _laughing_?”

_No._ But her twitching lips give proof to the lie.

“You are!”

_No, I'm not._

“That – that is a full-on _giggle_ , Rose Tyler. You are. You're laughing at me,” the Doctor sniffs, “laughing at my pain.”

_Don't be such a baby. I thought you'd take it as a compliment._

“Not when it's from your mother! _And_ I turned her down – thought that would be the end of. . . . Hang on,” he pauses, mouth working soundlessly as he struggles to voice an idea so terrible, so appalling, so impossible that it can't possibly be possible, “when did she . . . or was it – no, you didn't, did you? Rose?”

_What?_

“You did!” He points at her, accusatory finger hovering a hair's-breadth from her left eye. “When I went back to the TARDIS, you two had your cuppas and you – you. . . .” His hand begins to tremble and Rose grasps it in her own, running the pad of her thumb gently across his quivering knuckles.

_Doctor, what are you talking about?_

“You talked about me like I was a piece of man meat! You just sat around, giggling and blogging and discussing my – my physical attributes. With your _mother_ , Rose Tyler – the one woman in the galaxy who I do not want knowing about said physical attributes and who also happens to be, well . . . the _mother_ to the one woman who I enjoy sharing those physical attributes with! And you shared detailed information of those physical attributes with – with. . . .”

_The enemy?_

“Yes! And – why are you laughing at me? Rose Tyler, this is _not_. . . .”

_I'm sorry._ Struggling to catch her breath, Rose swipes at her streaming eyes. _God, I'm sorry, Doctor._

“No, you aren't.”

_I_ am _._

“You're still laughing,” the Doctor points out, pouting. “You're just worried I'm going to withhold sex.”

_Thought never even crossed my mind._

Unsure whether to be assuaged or insulted, the Doctor sniffs again. “Yes. Well. I still might.” He narrows his eyes as Rose giggles again. “Oh, for Rassilon's – what's so funny _this_ time?”

_Nothing._

“Is the thought of my withholding sex so amusing?” Rose puts a hand to her mouth to cover a laugh. “Right. Well. That answers that.”

_No, Doctor, it's not -_

“Oh, no, Rose Tyler, you made your bed, now you have to lay in it. Due to your – insubordination, sexual intercourse will be withheld for one week.” With a single, decisive nod, the Doctor turns onto his side, facing away from Rose, tugging the covers with him as he does so. She'll be pulling out the Puppy-Dog Eyes any second now and, even without looking at her, it will be a job in and of itself to resist that soft, supplicatory tone that tells him he would be the sweetest, smartest, bravest male life-form in the world if he could just do this one little thing for her.

_OK._

“OK?”

_OK._

“No sex. For one week.”

_I heard you._

“None whatsoever. Even if you really want to. Even if you ingest some powerful alien aphrodisiac, I won't do a thing about it.”

_OK._

“Well, I will. Might, rather. _Might_. But only if it's fatal. Or severely inconveniencing in some way. Or if we're in a position where you'll have to have sex with someone else to . . . get your fix, as it were. But that's _it_.” He taps the bed frame for emphasis.

_OK._

Warily, the Doctor flips over to face her again, mouth set in a firm line, ready to clamp his eyes shut the second she bats her own. For a second, he thinks Rose is crying – face buried in the pillow, shoulders shaking silently – and he curses himself, ready to gather her into his arms, to take it all back then and there, before he catches a glimpse of those twitching lips, that tongue-touched grin.

“How can you possibly be laughing at me again?”

Shifting onto her side, Rose just looks at him, still grinning, tongue poking out from between her teeth. Normally, he would consider the move endearing, now he's just annoyed.

“ _What_ , Rose?”

_Thursday._

It's barely an answer at all, but it's answer enough for the Doctor.

Thursday is April twenty-seventh.

Thursday is Monday when they stand in the lobby of the Royal Hope Hospital and watch a beaming Pete wheel an exhausted Jackie and an impossibly small pink-and-yellow bundle out into the bright afternoon sunlight. He bends to press a kiss to his infant daughter's head before going to get the car and when Rose starts crying, just like yesterday when she couldn't stop and he couldn't tell her to – not when he had put her in this situation in the first place – he wraps his arms around her, just like yesterday, and lets the shoulder of his leather jacket grow damp again.

Once Rose has drifted into a sleep that is, if not entirely peaceful, at least not one filled with terrors of reapers and dead fathers and dead Doctors, he pilots them to the Powell Estates and leaves an envelope stuffed with pound notes on the Tylers' doorstep. From inside, he can hear baby Rose crying and shuffling footsteps as one of the proud parents makes their way toward the nursery. He hates that sound, the crying, and resolves then and there to never make her cry again.

He dedicates himself to her happiness for the next few weeks, planning trips to fun fairs and shopping malls and concerts (with the occasional bit of running thrown in for good measure) and, as she smiles and laughter and teasing becomes more frequent, so does his own become more genuine. It's all going fantastically till that botched surprise party where he knew he was supposed to act surprised – but how was he supposed to when tissue-paper streamers and party hats peeked out from under her bed and the TARDIS decided to break down on the very day that was marked with a bright blue _X_ on her calendar? – and, idiot that he was, he'd made her cry again.

The only way he could see to make it up to her was a birthday party of her own and he laughs away her tired protests and vague gestures toward the calendar on her bedroom wall, planting a party hat on top of her bedhead and pushing her toward the kitchen where Jack waits, blowing a kazoo for all it's worth.

_'S only August, Doctor._ She sinks down into a kitchen chair, waving Jack playfully away when he leans in for a birthday kiss.

“Time's relative, Rose Tyler.” Sidling between the two in a single, subtle move, the Doctor hands her a cuppa, made just the way she likes it. She glares at him through crusty, bloodshot eyes, but takes it anyway. “Besides, you know I can't always control when the TARDIS lands.”

She takes a sip of tea. _That's an understatement._

“And if it just so happens to be on a pleasure planet, then so be it, right Doc?” Jack adds, flashing him a toothy grin. “On their annual celebration of independence, too. Which just so happens to fall on Rosie's birthday. That's quite a coincidence.”

“Isn't it, Captain?” The Doctor grins right back, gritting his teeth, a smile that quickly becomes more genuine, crinkling the corners of his eyes, as he spots Rose, stifling her giggle with a second sip of tea.

Another coincidence comes two months later, after he's separated from her in the midst of an interplanetary rebellion, her only answer as to what happened the body of a dead woman who died in her arms. Jack doesn't say a word when he just so happens to land at the Powell Estates on April twenty-seventh.

He never stops calling them coincidences, and she never stops treating them like they are. Sometimes it feels like an in-joke between them and she will ask exactly how old she is now?

_I must be fifty by now, Doctor!_

“You're holding up well for your age, Rose Tyler, I've got to say.”

But she grows older right before his eyes, anyway. When her birthday, her _real_ birthday, rolls around, he doesn't take them anywhere. He still makes a fuss – he's the new-new Doctor by then, if he isn't making a fuss, she's asking him if something's wrong and nothing can be wrong, not today, not on Rose Tyler's birthday – he bakes a cake and gets chips from her favorite shop and waits, stomach churning, as she unwraps her present.

“And look, it even has a cleaning mechanism right in . . . here. This little button, see? So next time we get drenched in alien goop, you don't have to worry.  Oh, and I can make the pockets bigger-on-the-inside, too, if you want. Setting eighty-three on the sonic. So you can store all your – your . . . well, I thought it would be easier than just carrying around some bag. . . . That is, if you want. Up to you. You like it, don't you? You like it?”

She laughs, shaking her head and pulls him in for a hug when he begins to babble, nuzzling her face into his shoulder, breathing in his new-new scent.

_I love it. Thank you._

His arms wind around her waist, squeezing tightly. “My pleasure.”

She's twenty now: One less year left for him to fit as many years as he can into. One less year between now and the inevitable day where they won't celebrate a close call with a coincidental landing and a shared slice of cake.

Still, sometimes he feels like those coincidences are the only thing keeping him sane, anchoring him to someone to whom birthdays still matter, who refuses to worry about that inevitable day because in this moment with cake and friends and strangely-colored skies, she is immortal, someone who is so simply, wonderfully human that it makes him want to be, too. In those moments, she makes it possible to forget about what the next week or the next day or the next minute might hold because right that very second she is hanging on his arm, dragging him toward the nearest vendor's stall or out onto the dance floor or towards the newest, death-defying rollercoaster, one that he is most certainly not afraid of, all he's saying is that the TARDIS is much more impressive and doesn't make one feel about to be reacquainted with yesterday’s lunch.

In the face of her Puppy-Dog Eyes - really, he should have built up some sort of tolerance by now - he is powerless to do anything but grin back and climb aboard, obsessively checking and rechecking the safety straps and lap bar, peppering the teenage operator with rapid-fire questions about g-force and velocity and torque.

Rose reaches for his hand, stroking a thumb across the fidgeting digits. _You'll be fine, Doctor._

“Well, I know that. It's _you_ I'm concerned for, Rose. These twenty-first century coasters . . . _very_ lax safety procedures. I can regenerate, but you – _you_ are a different . . . oh, what's that creaking sound? I do _not_ like that creaking sound, Rose Tyler. That boy down there couldn't even tell me the name of the inspector. I think they're hiding something here, Rose. Got to be. Assuming we survive this, we are – why are we stopping? Is it over? Why are we up so high? Surely they won't – I know you humans are barbaric, but this is just foo-. . . .”

Later, safely ensconced in the TARDIS, amusement park conspiracy theory debunked and apology made for the finger-shaped bruises ringing her wrist, Rose says that she never knew Time Lords could scream so loud.

“No louder than you, Rose Tyler,” he retorts, arching an eyebrow. “I’ve had to rescue you from a spider in the shower before, remember.”

One side of her mouth tilting up in a smile, Rose rolls her eyes - a tacit denial.

It’s another twenty-four days, ten hours, and sixteen minutes, one more terrifying, exhilarating plunge later, that he proves her wrong. Drawing her sweat-sheened body into his chest for a post-coital cuddle - their first and one of the most brilliant cuddles ever devised by the universe - he doesn’t attempt to hide his smug smirk.

“Told you you were the louder one.”

_Yeah._ The monosyllable comes out in a giggle. _Always thought it’d be you, to be honest._

“Did you?”

_Well, yeah._ She traces idle patterns across his chest, an absentminded gesture that makes him shiver. He wonders if she realizes she’s spelling her own name across his skin, marking him as hers just as she is his. _You’re always talking so much that I figured it would just . . . transfer to the bedroom. Thought you’d explain the exact science of the orgasm or something._

“Oh.” He pauses, considering. “Would you like me to?”

She tilts her head to stare up at him, eyebrows drawn together in thought. _Would it hurt your feelings if I said no?_

“‘Course not.” Running his thumb across her forehead to smooth out the creases, he presses a kiss to her mess of blonde hair. “I just want you to be happy, Rose.”

_That’s nice._ From the tone of her voice, the movement of her hand under the covers as it works its’ way steadily downward to wrap around his member, to slowly stroke and squeeze, he knows she is teasing him.

“Nice?” he echoes, in a voice that he means to be a growl but comes out a gasp instead. Grasping the offending hand in one of his own, he rolls her over, pinning her underneath him.

“I’ll show you _nice_ , Rose Tyler.”

Rose doesn’t appear to mind the reprimand; does, in fact, reiterate the offending term over next morning’s breakfast. The Doctor, in turn, has no compunction against showing her just how nice he can be. Sweet and passionate and ridiculously mushy - the type of man who will consent to being called _cute_ in one breath as he cleans his sticky-sweet fingers of syrup and _oh, God_ in another as said fingers acquire another sweet taste (far more brilliant than syrup, even when paired with banana pancakes), one that he laps off while she lies quivering beneath him.

“Happy birthday,” he murmurs against her lips and he grins when she rolls her eyes, muttering about adorable nutters and happy accidents.

These are all the things he has never thought of being before her and that he now can’t think of not being. How can he, with her sharing his bed, his home, his hearts?

His forever.

Even if that forever is rapidly drawing a close.

Three days from now will be Rose’s birthday - her real birthday, not one of the coincidences where he sets the TARDIS controls the night before and peppers her face with eager, giddy kisses the next morning, all ready to justify a day spent in bed, to fulfill her every whim and to revel in the pleasure that comes from causing hers.

Three days from now will be Rose’s birthday, the first real birthday she’s celebrated since they’ve become an official couple-y couple, the kind who kisses in photo booths and engages in birthday sex on a weekly basis.

Three days from now will be Rose’s birthday - well-within the period of self-imposed abstinence.

Of course he’s prepared all the traditional birthday trappings: a tour of her favorite places in the universe, a candlelit dinner at a sixty-first century Italian joint, a present to unwrap. To go along with the requisite jewelry (this time a pair of earrings, one with two hearts and the other with one), he’s compiled a slideshow of their adventures into a memory cube, a projection of daring and danger to watch whenever the mood strikes her. At least, that was the best tagline he could come up with. He doesn’t doubt that she’ll be pleased, he doesn’t doubt that he will be happy at her happiness, as it is impossible for him to be anything but. But all the while he will know, will compare, these cries of delight and _Doctor, you shouldn’t have_ ’s to the noises she could be making: her cries as she reaches climax and that indescribable, incredible sound when he does the thing with his tongue that he likes to save for special occasions. They will both know.

There will be no morning kisses, soft and slow, or the sound of skin against skin as their bodies move in tandem. There will be no hurried undressing or sonicing of clothing (tearing off her more expensive underthings has gone from fiercely passionate to _you’d better fix that, Doctor_ ) when they return from their night on the town. There will be no Rose, nestled against him, breath slowly evening out as she comes down from her high and together, they drift off to sleep.

At best there will be kisses, cautious and chaste, and they will watch the digital scrapbook of their history, sate on opposite sides of the bed before they fall into an uneasy sleep, back to back.

At worst, she will hate him. She will think that she means nothing to him, that she is nothing more than a silly human pet, a toy with which to play or throw away at his leisure. She will remember Reinette and how easily he left her then. She will think that he is trying to distance himself from her again, that this commitment has grown too much for him, that she is no longer wanted in his bed, his home, his hearts.

She will leave him and it will be all his fault.

But that is three days from now. Three days that he refuses to think as past in any timeline or parallel universe. When it comes to events of this magnitude, time is most certainly not relative. There is no such thing as a fixed moment in time, no event that cannot be altered. When it comes to Rose, he refuses to let there be. He can still fix this.

“Thursday.” It isn’t the best answer he’s given, but it will have to do for now. “Thursday, Thursday, Thursday. _Thurrrsday_. That’s a fun word, isn’t it? Thursday?”

Rose raises her eyebrows, but otherwise remains still. She doesn’t giggle, her lips don’t twitch. It’s disconcerting, this silence, and the Doctor feels compelled to fill it.

“So. Thursday.”

He runs an agitated hand through his hair. Any second now, she will turn away from him, wish him a frosty _good night_. And here he is, staring blankly, letting them tick away - second after second, the loss of each one less he will be able to spend with her - while she stares back at him.

Then, in a stroke of brilliance, it comes to him.

“I didn’t specify which week, you know.” When her brows remain raised, he continues, “When I withheld sex, Rose. I didn’t specify which week.”

He waits, eyes wide and expectant, for her eyes to widen in understanding, to wrap her arms around him and praise him as the sweetest, smartest, bravest male life-form in the all the universe and has to squelch the surge of disappointment when she does no more than nod in reply.

“So that means the week we don’t have sex could be any week,” he continues, smiling broadly and encouraging her to do the same. Obligingly, her lips tilt upward in response.

“And time is relative, remember.”

_I remember._ Her mouth curves in what is almost a full smile and the disappointment is supplanted by something akin to hope.

“So the week we didn’t have sex, Rose,” he says slowly, weighing each syllable with the utmost deliberation. “That could be a week that’s already past. One of the weeks where we weren’t having sex anyway. You see? So we wouldn’t have to worry about Thursday - or any other day, really - and it wouldn’t be a breach of contract.”

_I see._

“Right. Of course you do. Because you’re brilliant. You’re Rose.” The Doctor clears his throat nervously, aware that he is babbling and unable to stop it for all of that. “So you . . . what you see because you’re so utterly brilliant - you know that I. . . . That is to say - you know I’m completely committed to you? Because under normal circumstances - not that I’m implying these _aren’t_ normal circumstances, you and me, in bed, cuddling. . . . Not that I’m trying to pressure you into an unwanted cuddle or anything like that. All I’m saying is - well . . . I’m not really sure what I’m saying. You should probably stop me soon, just a thought. But normally, I would never have forgotten or done something nearly as drastic as - as. . . .”

_Denying sex._

“Yes, exactly! Thank you, Rose Tyler. So you see that, don’t you? Of course you do. You already _said_ you did. That you see what I’m saying and you understand my point-of-view and all that couples’ therapy type-stuff?” Rose frowns, brow furrowing, and the Doctor blanches. “Not that I’m implying you did say any of those things. Not explicitly or - or not at all. Not at all, I mean to say. If you’re still mad, you have every right to be.”

_You think I’m mad?_

“You’re not?”

_Why would I be?_

The Doctor could cry in relief, but settles for scooting the couple of inches closer and burrowing his face into the crook of her neck. Relief and Rose flooding his senses in equal measure, he lets himself breathe her in.

_Doctor,_ she says eventually, nudging his cheek with her nose, _you can’t seriously think I’m mad about the sex thing, can you?_

Well-aware that he is acting centuries younger than his professed age, the Doctor shakes his head stubbornly against her shoulder. Still, he can feel his ears burning.

“The longest answer you gave me was three syllables, Rose. Three.”

_Well, yeah._ She turns to nudge at him again and he presses a soft kiss to the crease where neck meets shoulder. _You got mad at me for laughing earlier, so I thought better not._

Guilt all but overwhelms him for a moment, to be quickly replaced by a mixture of outrage and irritation at Rose’s confession. He jerks his head from its’ position to face her, eyes narrowed.

“You were laughing at me?”

_I_ wasn’t _laughing at you,_ she corrects patiently. _That’s kinda the point._

“But you _wanted_ to laugh at me.”

Doctor, you called it a breach of contract. Like we’d taken an Unbreakable Oath or something.

“You wanted to laugh at me,” he repeats, suppressing the urge to correct her reference with difficulty.

_You bent the laws of time and space so we could have sex, Doctor. I’m not saying it’s not impressive, just -_ her lips twitch and the Doctor can’t help his own goofy grin, even if it is at his own expense _\- well, you have to admit it’s a bit ridiculous._

“Birthday sex, Rose,” he says, pleadingly. “On your _real_ birthday. Couldn’t just let it pass us by, could I?”

_No,_ says Rose, and for a moment it looks like she is going to say something more. _No, ‘course you couldn’t._

The Doctor quirks an eyebrow. “You want to laugh at me, don’t you?”

Without a word or even a giggle, she presses her lips to his. Her hands tangle in his hair, tugging at it just the way he likes. Denying his tongue entrance, she nips at his lower lip before moving her own mouth along his jaw, his throat, his collarbone. She laps at his skin and he can’t help a little whimper in response, can’t help but wonder if she knows his noises as well as he knows hers. If she revels in causing his pleasure as much as he does hers.

In short, if Rose Tyler is insatiable as he is.

_I love you, you daft alien,_ she reminds him, lips dipping slowly lower, _but sometimes you are_ such _a bloke._


	20. Neighbors - Martha

In theory, alien life is nonexistent. The spaceship on Christmas Day was an elaborate hoax, a misguided attempt to highlight what makes Britain so great. She only has Tish’s word to go on, anyway.

In theory, time travel is impossible. There are too many paradoxes to consider, everyone would probably have killed their grandfather by now otherwise. Besides, she can’t stomach the idea that there might have been someone, even a future someone, who could’ve saved Adeola and didn’t.  

In theory, unrequited love is exhausting. She sees the look in her mum’s eyes when her dad flirts shamelessly with Annalise, saying more than her snide remarks ever could. It’s the look that says she’d take him back after everything - the lying and the cheating and the endless, obnoxious PDA - if he’d only let her. That there is nothing he could do that would make her stop loving him.

Theory, Martha decides, is bullshit. Adjusting her position on the TARDIS jumpseat she scrubs harder at her favorite top, currently spotted with the slime of some alien slug, and does her level-best not to grimace at the sound of fast-approaching footsteps. Seconds later Rose dashes into the room, the Doctor hot on her heels; without so much as a greeting, Rose loops one way around the console while the Doctor circles the other. They stop on opposite sides, facing each other.

“Admit it!” The Doctor’s cheeks are flushed, his hair in complete disarray and for the barest of moments Martha hopes, and is ashamed of hoping, that they might actually be fighting.

But then Rose cries “Never!” and they’re both laughing, leaning on the console for support. The TARDIS judders sharply as the Doctor presses his full weight onto a lever and they stumble backward, laughing harder.

They never have real fights, not really - just those cute, couple-y fights that no one really counts, like whose turn it is to do the dishes (which the TARDIS does anyway as long as you ask her nicely) or what to watch on telly (he always picks Disney and Rose always puts up a fuss but sings the songs along with him, anyway) - and she hates herself for hating that about them.

The Doctor ducks left and Rose feints right before changing course and making for the hall again. In a few long strides, Rose is caught up in his arms and tossed over his shoulder with ease. She pounds her fists half-heartedly against his back but the Doctor only tightens his hold, long fingers teasing lightly at her ribcage and armpits, the backs of her knees and the soles of her feet. Rose shivers at his touch and Martha wonders idly if there will come a day where, so oblivious to her presence, they will begin to disrobe in front of her.

She wonders what he looks like under all those layers; he’s only wearing the henley today and when he spins Rose around it rides up, revealing just a glimpse of back dimples. Gritting her teeth, Martha focuses her gaze back on the slime-stained top.

“Last chance, Rose Tyler,” he warns.

“Never! Never ev- . . . Martha?” Rose grins at her from her precarious position and Martha raises a hand in greeting.

“No. Doctor, remember?” he corrects with exaggerated patience. “Devilishly handsome bloke you travel the universe with?”

“No.” Rose echoes him, smacking his shoulder, “ _Martha_. Remember? The other girl you travel the universe with?”

It’s a throwaway line, not meant to be mean-spirited anymore than their earlier ignorance of her was. Nothing they do is ever meant to be mean. Still, Martha can’t help but flinch.

Isn’t that just her in a nutshell?

“Oh!” The Doctor cranes his neck, eyes widening in surprise sending her a brilliant, slightly bashful grin. “Martha! Was wondering where you’d got off to . . . er, how - how long have you been there?”

“Half-hour?” Martha shrugs. “I went to find that stain-remover Rose told me about.”

“You found it alright, then?” Rose wiggles in the Doctor’s grip and he sets her carefully back on the floor. One hand remains on her waist even after her feet touch the grating. “How’s it working?”

Martha holds the fuchsia top, spotted with neon-green and yellow hues, up for her inspection and Rose winces in sympathy.

“The TARDIS’ll take care of that in no time,” the Doctor scoffs. “Rose, what lies have you been telling her?”

“Not on this lot, it doesn’t,” Rose vollies back. “I tried that last time and lost half my wardrobe.”

“I fail to see the problem here.”

Rose rolls her eyes, sending Martha a _can-you-believe-him_ expression. “She jettisoned them off into space, Doctor. It’s something in their slime that the old girl can’t handle, I reckon.”

“Rose, the TARDIS is the height of Time Lord technology. She is the most sophisticated vessel in all of time and space. She can travel anywhere in time and space. And she is not about to be brought down by a bit of Flobberworm gunk.”

“Well, her washing machine certainly was.”

“Wait - they’re called Flobberworms?” asks Martha, half-laughing.

It’s silly to think of it as their _thing_ , she knows. More than silly, she imagines the old Martha saying. Deluded. _Things_ were for couples, not _other girls_.

But he was still the one to find her that first night - after Shakespeare and the Carrionites and a well-placed Disarming Spell, long after the Doctor and Rose had disappeared for a round of celebratory we-survived sex and the TARDIS, even then, had somehow led her to the one place she needed to be.

“Thought you’d be in bed by now,” he said, settling beside her on the couch.

“Doctor-in-training, remember?” said Martha. “I’m used to weird hours.”

She didn’t mention that neither he nor Rose had mentioned anything about a bed, that she had been planning a kip on the library sofa. If she did, he’d just start babbling again - she’d known the man less than twenty-four hours and already recognized gibberish as his default - and she wanted to enjoy this moment while she could. No Rose, with her bleach-blonde hair and flirty, tongue-touched smile. Just the Doctor and Martha.

“Oh, that’s right.” The Doctor nodded. He tugged on one ear, staring straight ahead; the fingers of his free hand drummed the arm of the couch.

“Where’s Rose?” she asked, because she felt like she should.

“Sleeping,” he answered. “We usually take breaks between adventures. First the Judoon and then all this . . . the Carrionites,” his jaw clenched, “well, she’s a bit tired out.”

“Oh.” It seemed the safest answer. Saying that she had just been through the exact same thing, and had her entire world-view shaken to boot, probably wasn’t the best way to endear yourself to the man piloting you across time and space.

“She’s getting over a bug, too,” the Doctor continued. He cast her a sideways, guilty grin. “We were at the hospital for a non-alien reason, believe it or not.”

“You’re not married, though.”

Even before the aliens, there’d seemed something a bit off about Mr. and Mrs. Tyler: the way his eyebrows waggled when he called her _sweetheart_ or _darling_ , as if they were playing at house, the way he took her left hand, stroking his thumb over and over across the thin golden band, not to mention the whole Benjamin Franklin thing that had left Dr. Stoker wanting to commit him right then and there. Of course she hadn’t had much time to worry about it during morning rounds and their relationship status had, at least in Martha’s mind, taken a backseat to the moon landing and the rhino aliens (though the Doctor had certainly had time for a thorough snog, DNA transfer or not). Now, though - now, she had to make sure.

“No. No, not married, no.” He breathed in, then out again - in relief or regret, Martha couldn’t tell. Averting her eyes, she turned back to the book in her lap.

“Is that Harry Potter?”

“Yeah.” Martha tilted the spine in his direction. “After everything today . . . well, I thought it fit.”

“Good choice.” He beamed at her, eyes crinkling at the corners and Martha couldn’t help but smile back. “Order of the Phoenix?”

“Yeah.”

He bounced up and down on the couch a few times, scooting closer to her with each upward movement, finally stopping with his head resting on her shoulder. “What part are you at?”

But his breath tickled her neck when he spoke and Martha knew if she turned to answer him, she’d end up snogging him instead. Clearing her throat and swallowing hard, she did the only thing she could: started to read.

She must have fallen asleep at some point because she woke covered in a blanket. There was a cup of tea and two slices of toast on the table next to the couch. The book was dog-eared at her stopping place. _Their_ stopping place. It seemed, she thought as she munched on her toast and sipped at her tea, strangely intimate and that same silly smile from last night settled over her face.

Until she got to the kitchen, drained cup in one hand and empty plate in the other. The Doctor slid a cup of tea across the counter to Rose and Rose slathered two slices of toast with two different types of jam. She handed one to the Doctor and he took a bite before kissing her with jam-sticky lips. He murmured something indistinguishable against them before releasing her.

Good mood vanishing, Martha backed slowly away from the door just as Rose glanced up.

“Morning, Martha!”

“Morning,” said Martha. She walked past them to rinse her dishes in the sink.

“Sleep well?”

“Pretty well. How are you feeling?”

“Loads better, thanks.” Rose smiled, nodding at the now-clean dishes. “I wasn’t sure how you liked your tea. Was that alright?”

“Oh.” Martha hoped neither of them heard the disappointment in her voice - of course it had been Rose, the Doctor hadn’t said a word since she’d entered the room - and she covered it with a smile of her own.“Oh, that’s . . . that’s fine, thanks.” In truth, she liked it bitterer.

She’s become a better liar since then. They all have.

“Martha, back me up!” Rose entreats her. She’s shoots Martha a tongue-touched grin, tucks a few flyaway strands of hair behind her ear. From behind her, Martha can see the Doctor shaking his head in a playful, emphatic _no_.

Martha hasn’t got a clue what they’re talking about, and is pretty sure they know she hasn’t got a clue what they’re talking about but are inviting her to play along anyway. What’s more, she’s tempted to answer, to pretend their friendship is nothing more than that.

It’s not like it’s their fault. Being in love is no one’s fault. Despite her mother’s snide comments over Rose’s dye job and the Doctor’s flirtatious mannerisms, Martha knows they’re nothing like her dad and Annalise. They rescued a hospital full of people the first day she met them and invited her aboard their magical blue box and into their life without a second thought. They share meals and memories and movie nights with her and will more than happily make their duet of _Hakuna Matata_ into a three-part harmony.

In the end, though, they aren’t the Doctor and Rose and Martha. They are theDoctorandRose, a single unit, leaving no space for anyone else to squeeze between. They are the couple with their own inside jokes that can only be explained with a _you-had-to-be-there_ , the couple that the snack bowl rests between on movie nights, the couple who will cuddle up on the library sofa together, open up to that turned-down page of Order of the Phoenix and begin to read.

“Martha?” Rose asks. “You alright?”

“Yeah,” lies Martha. “Yeah. Just remembered I have a few more, erm . . . Flobberworm-ified things in my room. OK to use this on them?” She lifts the bottle of stain remover.

“Oh,” says Rose. “Yeah, that’s fine.”

“Flobberworm-ified,” laughs the Doctor. “I like that.”

“There should be another bottle in the laundry room if you need it.”

“Thanks.”

“We’ll be watching a movie later if you want to join us. Ladies’ choice, so we can get something non-Disney for once,” she teases, poking the Doctor in the ribs.

Martha laughs. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

“And watch another one of your Nicholas Sparks adaptations?” The Doctor wrinkles his nose. “I don’t think so.”

Rose rolls her eyes. “Oh, please. I caught you watching _The Notebook_ by yourself the other night. And crying.”

She’s barely a half-dozen steps down the hall before they’re at it again. Shutting the library door behind her, she sends a quick thank-you to the TARDIS as their voices become more distant and muffled than seems altogether normal.

The book is waiting for her on the side table, just as it usually is. Sometimes it’s a medical text to keep her mind sharp, sometimes it’s a fluffy, steamy romance to keep her mind off the Doctor, and sometimes, as it usually is when she’s feeling particularly angst-ridden, there is a Harry Potter book sitting beside a cup of tea and a plate of her favorite shortbread biscuits.

Martha runs a grateful hand along one of the TARDIS’s coral struts before sinking onto the far side of the sofa. She blows on her tea and takes a small sip before opening the book to her last stopping place. The Doctor and Rose are still on the fifth book - a final reread before book seven’s release - but Martha’s progressed to Half-Blood Prince by now. Funny how much reading you can get done when there’s no one beside you, nuzzling at your neck and trailing kisses down your jaw and asking to do that voice again, Doctor, it was hilarious.

 

_“Looking for Ron?” she asked, smirking. “He’s over there, the filthy hypocrite.”_

_Harry looked into the corner she was indicating. There, in full view of the whole room, stood Ron wrapped so closely around Lavender Brown it was hard to tell whose hands were whose._

_“It looks like he’s eating her face, doesn’t it?” said Ginny dispassionately. “But I suppose he’s got to refine his technique somehow. Good game, Harry.”_

_She patted him on the arm; Harry felt a swooping sensation in his stomach, but then she walked off to help herself to more butterbeer. Crookshanks trotted after her, his yellow eyes fixed upon Arnold._

_Harry turned away from Ron, who did not look like he would be surfacing soon, just as the portrait hole was closing. With a sinking feeling, he thought he saw a mane of bushy brown hair whipping out of sight._

 

Holding the book open with one hand, Martha takes another sip of tea, breathes out in a deep, shuddering sigh. She remembers how it goes, how much it used to annoy her. The logical and level-headed Hermione, Martha’s childhood hero, gets upset over a guy. A guy who can’t commit, a guy who chooses someone else, a guy who that girl has to watch with that someone else day in and day out, knowing that she was the one passed over. Knowing that she is just _the other girl_.

Martha wonders if there are any planets with trained attack canaries.

**...**

In theory, the Doctor argues, it would be a waste of their magnificent time-and-spaceship not to use it to travel to July 2007.

In theory, Martha reminds him, such a magnificent time-and-spaceship shouldn’t exist at all. Nor is this something they want to draw attention to by having intimate knowledge of one of the most anticipated novels in history months before its’ release.

Rose says that she couldn’t care less about theory, she just doesn’t want to spoil anyone. Plus, she needs time to get her costume ready.

“And you’re wearing one too, mister,” she says, pointing a threatening finger in the Doctor’s  direction. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten.”

Several months and several-dozen flirtatious chases around the console later, the Doctor’s only concession is to wear a long, black robe over his pinstripes instead of his usual trenchcoat. He’s meant to be the Harry to Rose’s Ginny, but receives several compliments on his Crouch Junior cosplay instead.

“Seriously, you guys could be twins or something,” says one Ron Weasley lookalike. “Can you do the tongue-thing?”

The Doctor obliges, brows waggling madly. He turns to Rose once the fans have dispersed, eyes darkening, voice lowering to a predatory growl. “I’ll show you mine if you’ll show me yours.”

“Oi, get a room you two!”

“Mickey!” Releasing the Doctor’s hand, Rose rushes to meet the man wending his way toward them, throwing her arms around him in an enthusiastic embrace. He disengages from her after a second and allows her to lead him back to where the Doctor and Martha are waiting.

“Mickety-mick-mickey!” The Doctor beams, bumping fists with the new man. “Long time, no see. Not that I’m complaining, mind you.”

Mickey laughs. “Good to see you too, Doctor.”

“What’ve you been up to, then?” Rose asks. “I feel like I haven’t seen you in ages. At least since Martha came.”

“Martha?”

“That’s me. Hello.” Martha waves a hand in greeting, smiling at Mickey; he smiles back, extends a hand for her to shake.

“Mickey Smith, nice to meet you. Hope these two aren’t driving you too crazy?”

“They have their moments.”

Mickey barks a second laugh, the sound rumbling up from his chest. “I know, right? Half the reason I left for Torchwood in the first place, they are.” It’s said lightly but Martha sees the look he darts in Rose’s direction: the same look her mother sends her father, that she sends the Doctor. It’s the look of the person passed over.

“Torchwood, bah,” the Doctor scoffs. “You want some real excitement, you gotta come along with the Stuff of Legends.” He throws an arm around Rose.

“Not for the world, mate.” Martha’s lips twitch at the Doctor’s affronted expression and Mickey grins at her. He gestures around himself at the sea of black robes and lit wands. "This is more than enough excitement for me, thanks.”

“What, is Torchwood worried aliens are gonna destroy Earth before we figure out who RAB is?” asks Martha, surprised at her own daring. Jokes of this caliber of rudeness are more the usually reserved for the Doctor but he and Rose have been accosted by another group of Crouch fans and are too caught up in their role-play to protest the temporary usurpation.

“I'd say yes if I knew who that was.”

“Well no one really knows who he is, do they? That's the point, isn’t it, he’s just this mysterious figure who . . ." she draws up short at Mickey's glassy-eyed expression, "oh, you really don't know what I'm talking about, do you?”

Mickey runs a hand uncomfortably along his close-cropped hair. “Sorry.”

"No. Oh, no, that’s alright.” Martha can feel her ears burning. “I just thought . . .  since you were - but that’s fine.”

“No, it isn’t.” He sounds so serious that Martha feels compelled to continue her apology, then she notices the thin line of his lips, tipped slightly upward in a smile. “Go on, tell me. How fast would it take this lot to lynch me if I told them I’d never read a word about Harry and Co?”

Martha pretends to consider. “Ten seconds, give or take. Longer if you’ve seen the films.”

“My gran took me to the first few.”

“Then twenty seconds, but you’re pushing it.”

It really isn’t that funny but Mickey laughs anyway. “You’re supposed to be that girl, right? The one with the weird name - Hermy-something” He nods at her carefully-constructed costume: knee socks and pleated skirt, a neatly-tied Gryffindor scarf and a bookbag thrown over one shoulder. She’s even tucked a replica model of a Time Turner, found for a bargain on a twenty-fourth century planet dedicated to the series, down the front of her blouse.

“Hermione,” Martha corrects.

“Right. That one.”

“Your chances of survival are increasing by the second.”

“Yeah?” Absurdly, Mickey’s chest puffs up with pride. “Well, you get good at surviving when you’re with the Doctor.”

“He doesn’t accept anything less,” Martha agrees. She pivots on her heel to scan the crowd for the pair. The Doctor is on one knee, having an intent discussion with a small blonde girl wearing a lion hat; Martha can’t hear them from this distance but whatever he says makes Rose and the little girl laugh. She smiles fondly at the group.

“Is he meant to be Harry, then? The Doctor?”

“That’s what it started out as,” says Martha. “I think he’s just Crouch Junior now.”

“Who?”

“Read the books and I’ll tell you.”

“If I read the books you won’t have to tell me.”

“Yes, but then I’ll have protected you from future lynchings.”

“Yes, but then I won’t have your number.”

For a moment, Martha can only stare. Vaguely, she hears the intercom buzz and announce ten minutes to midnight; the crowd around her buzzes in excitement while her mouth opens and closes, searching for words that won’t come.

“Sorry,” says Mickey again. “You have a boyfriend, don’t you? Or,” he eyes the Doctor, lips pursing, “or something.”

“No,” says Martha quickly, the word’s usual sting barely registering in her mind. “No, that’s not - we’re not. . . .”

“I know you’re not,” says Mickey, looking frustrated. “ _They_ weren’t for years before they were anything - anything you or I would consider anything. But that doesn’t mean . . . well, I still lost Rose the first day she met him. ‘Cause he’s Harry, right? And I’m just Mickey Smith. Not much of a choice, is it?”

Again, Martha is silent barely managing to sputter, “Are you crazy?” before Mickey is rambling on again.

“I’m not blaming you or nothing! That’s what I did with Rose and cost me the little chance I had with her. ‘S not like it’s your fault but I don’t - I can’t . . . just forget I said anything, right?”

“Mickey, give me your phone.”

“What?” But he’s already digging the mobile from his pocket. Martha snatches it from his hand and enters her digits into it before placing it back in his hand. Her fingers intertwine with his.

“Call me after you’ve read the books. I’m not dating someone who thinks Hermione should end up with Harry. Or Crouch Junior,” she adds, almost as an afterthought. “From what I hear, he’s shacked up with a hot blonde, anyway.”

When Mickey smiles at her, she doesn’t feel like the other girl.


	21. Neighbors II - Donna

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone interested, this story makes a brief reference to a one-shot of mine, Best Friends Forever.

Donna doesn’t tell the Doctor how many one-night stands he’s made her miss out on, mostly because she is afraid of the solution he’d propose. It is, apparently, a universal fact that no matter where they land in time and space, blokes are insecure enough in their masculinity to assume that she and the Doctor are a pair whenever he approaches with her requested pint and sits down beside her, waggling his fingers at whatever man who had been, till two seconds ago, chatting her up.

“I am sorry,” said one who, she could see under his loincloth, was hung like a horse. “I did not realize.” Feeling about ready to scream in frustration, Donna had dismissed the Doctor’s concern with a _don’t worry about it, Spaceman_.

“Donna,” he’d persisted, “this race is extremely sensitive. The tiniest thing you say, they might take it as a major slight. Are you _sure_ you didn’t. . . .”

Donna took a long swallow of her drink. “Trust me, Doctor. It’s nothing.”

If a man couldn’t understand what she and the Doctor were to each other then he wasn’t someone she wanted in her life. It would never be a question of choosing one over the other, but of when the man would come along who wouldn’t ask her to.

But if she just so happened to run into Loincloth Man again at this planet’s version of a police station - where she was bailing out the Doctor and Rose out for public indecency, no less - Donna certainly wasn’t one to let opportunity pass her by. Besides, they’d be leaving in the morning anyway and she’d always had a thing for a man in uniform. Especially when that man happened to remark that he would remain ever-loyal to such a beautiful woman (unlike the good-for-nothing scumbag in the cell down the hall) and didn’t look at her like she was mad when she said they were just friends. (To be fair, experiencing the Doctor’s drunken rambles about the scent of Rose’s hair firsthand probably lent more than usual credence to this argument.)

“So you are just friends?”

“Yes.”

“You are a man and a woman of childbearing age and you are just friends?”

“Yeah. Rose, she’s his woman for childbearing and you know what they say about too many cooks.”

“And you, Donna. Would you like to bear children?”

But this just so happened to be the day that Donna skipped the pill and it turned out the whole bear children bit wasn’t just a pickup line, leaving Donna as the broodmare for a litter of blue-skinned, ginger-haired children who followed the Doctor around like a bunch of baby chicks and called him _Daddy_ because Loincloth Man (who was the real good-for-nothing scumbag, talk about irony) had up and left her for Rose instead which left the Doctor grief-stricken and angst-ridden till, on the kids’ fifth birthday, he told her he wanted to be their father in more than name and ghosted a hand down her bare thigh.

Donna chokes on a scream. Jolting upward in bed, she places a hand to her racing heart, waiting for it to resume its’ normal pace before flopping back onto the mattress with a groan. Leave it to the Doctor to turn a perfectly nice wet-dream into a nightmare.

“Donna? Donna, are you alright?”

Speak of the devil.

“I’m fine, Doctor.”

“I heard screaming.”

“I’m fine, Doctor.” She knows exactly what a nightmare about having sex with your best mate on top of an ice-cream cake means and isn’t up to being psychoanalyzed and/or heckled for the next month because she ate too much of it the night before.

“You don’t . . . have somewhere in there, do you?”

“Yes, and Channing and I would prefer some privacy, thank you.” There’s a lengthy pause, the shuffling of socked feet, and she adds, “I’m kidding.”

“I knew that.” He goes quiet again but Donna watches the doorknob twist under his hand, the door ease slowly open.

“I can hear you, you know.”

The tip of the Doctor’s nose is visible between door and wall. “Do you want a cuppa?”

“No.”

“Hot cocoa? Coffee? We have some leftover ice-cream cake in the fridge.”

Donna wraps the covers tighter around herself. “Doctor, I want to sleep.”

“But _I_ can’t sleep.”

“Then go bother Rose.”

“But Rose is _already_ asleep. You’re awake.”

“Doctor. . . .”

“Please? You don’t have to get up, I can come in there. I can just sit there.”

“While I sleep.”

“If you want.”

“You have no idea how creepy you sound right now, do you?” But Donna is already swinging her legs out of bed, the image of the puppy-dog eyes he must be making serving to propel her from its’ warmth.

“Donna? Donna, you didn’t go back to sleep, did you?” He sounds almost worried and Donna sends the nose tip a strange look before reaching for her dressing gown.

“Donna?”

“Don’t get your panties in a wad, Spaceman, I’m - oi!” Donna clutches the bathrobe to her chest as the door is pushed open . “Who the hell do you think you are?”

“You can’t go back to sleep,” he says with all the authority of a five-year-old announcing the sky is purple.

“What if I was naked?”

“You’re not.”

“But what if I _was_?”

“The TARDIS would have told me if you were naked.”

“The _TARDIS_ would have told you if I was. . . .” Donna grits her teeth; any attempt to convince the Doctor of his borderline-Edward Cullen tendencies is an exercise in futility (“Time Lords don’t sparkle, Donna”). At least if he looked like Robert Pattinson she could forgive him these shortcomings, but no. All Donna Noble gets is a stretched-out, bug-eyed bloke in a pink bathrobe that reveals far too much of his far-too-skinny legs.

“Sorry,” he offers after a second, one hand flying to the back of his head. “You shouldn’t grind your teeth like that, it’s - right, sorry.”

“Did the TARDIS tell you I had a nightmare, then?” Donna asks, tone softening slightly. However misguided this attempt may be, he’s obviously worried

“Something like that.”

“Something like what?”

“Well, first _I_ had a nightmare. And then the TARDIS told me _you’d_ had a nightmare - or, rather, that your sleep pattern had been disrupted which is odd because you’re usually a pretty sound sleeper. A very sound sleeper. An _extremely_ sound sleeper. Seriously, Donna, do you have any idea how many amazing sunrises you’ve missed out on just because. . . .”

“Doctor. The point, please?”

“Right. Yes. The point. The _point_.” He drags out the two syllables for an impressive length of time, managing to pop both the _p_ and the _t_. “The point, Donna Noble, is that I was worried and, being your best mate, I went to check on you because, being your brilliant best mate, I thought we may have had. . . .”

“Oh, my _god_. That’s why you mentioned the ice-cream cake, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” he admits, gaze fixed on his feet. “Yes, it is.”

“Oh, my god.” Donna sinks to the bed, burying her face in her hands but just as quickly springs back up again. The Doctor, hand extended in midair as if he was debating putting it on her shoulder, starts back. “Why would you even come to me after something like that?”

“You’re my best mate. I thought - I. . . .” The Doctor’s hand drops to his side but Donna is too angry to feel guilty. “I thought we could sort it.”

“Sort it?” Donna screeches incredulously. “ _Sort_ it? Doctor, this is not something you just - just sort out! This is not something you go to your best mate about. This is the equivalent of seeing your best mate in his underwear! How hard would it have been to get dressed before we had this conversation, anyway?”

“I was a bit out-of-sorts.”

“Were you?” Donna mocks. “Were you a bit _out-of-sorts_? Well, guess what? So was I! Especially when my best mate shows up in a teeny pink bathrobe to tell me that we’d apparently had some telepathic mind-meld thing about shagging on top of a birthday cake!”

“Which we wouldn’t be dealing with in the first place if you hadn’t insisted on these bloody things.” The Doctor pulls back the sleeve of the bathrobe, shaking his friendship-braceleted wrist in her face.

“Oi, don’t you go blaming this on me! You’re the one whose mind is like a dirty Dr. Seuss novel!”

“So I was the one who invited Conan, was I? I can assure you, Donna, I don’t have a thing for loinclothed blokes. Ask Jack.”

“Oh, no, you just have a lactose fetish!”

“You’re the one who had a litter of kids! Are your sexual urges so repressed that. . . .”

“Doctor, I do _not_ want to talk to you about this right now.”

“I’m worried about you, Donna. You act like what Rose and I do is such a depraved activity . . .”

“You two can make breathing look dirty.”

“. . . and I see you chatting up guys every time we go out, but you never seem to make the next move. Do you really consider yourself that undesirable? Because you’re not. You’re a very - very . . .”

“Doctor, if the next word out of your mouth is sensual, I will punch you in the face.”

“. . . _special_ woman, Donna. Any man would be lucky to have you in his life.”

“But not you.”

“No.” His answer is immediate and unequivocal but he locks his eyes to the ground a moment later, looking for all the world like a man who’d just confessed to genocide. He mutters something that might be an apology but Donna ignores it.

“Good. I’d prefer not to have to kill you for cheating on Rose.” At his lack of response Donna briefly nudges his shoulder with her own, inviting him to face her. She makes a show of stroking her chin and twisting her mouth in thought before continuing. “At least that would make it easy, though. I’d only have to reach across the bed and strangle you or suffocate you or something. After I finished picking up the pieces of my shattered self-esteem.”

The Doctor’s lips twitch and Donna counts her little act a success.

“So you’re not attracted to me either, then?”

“Spaceman, that was never even in question.”

“Good. That - that’s good.” But he can’t suppress an audible sigh of relief and Donna allows him to envelop her for a hug, strategically positioning herself to avoid the lower, less-clad half of his body.

“I told you, Doctor,” Donna reminds him after several silent seconds, winding her arms around his shoulders to return the embrace, “I’m not going anywhere.”

“I know. But if you ever want to. If you ever change your mind.”

“I won’t.”

“Or if you think Rose and I are ever being - being _adorably obnoxious_ or we’re making you uncomfortable or. . . .”

“You’re always adorably obnoxious.” And, as the Doctor blanches, eyes going wide in panic, “Doctor, you’re the Doctor and Rose. You’re the textbook definition of adorably obnoxious and I’m not about to make you change that just for me.”

“But if it bothers you. . . .”

“Sure, it does. But you’re my best friend, you show me these amazing things . . . you help me do things I never thought I could do. I’m not about to leave you over a few pairs of underwear in the library.”

“Done.”

“Did you even hear what I said?”

“‘Course I did. No more underwear in the library. Got it. Anything else?” He bounces on the balls of his feet, awaiting her next command.

Donna knows she should reiterate her point. She knows she should tell him that he and Rose are two of the most important people in the universe to her and she couldn’t imagine leaving them anymore than she could chopping off her own arm. She knows she should remind him that she isn’t Martha, that she doesn’t feel shunted to the side, that she has no problem intruding when they’ve been making googly eyes at each other for three hours straight because he promised to take her to the universe’s largest shopping mall to find a suitable replacement for the pair of heels he lost in the time vortex. Because Donna Noble isn’t anyone’s third wheel, she’s the Doctor’s best friend.

And every best friend needs to be humiliated a bit now and then.

“You know, I wouldn’t mind some more of that cake.”


	22. Neighbors III - Jack

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is a slight suicide trigger warning on this chapter. If this is something you are sensitive to, I'd suggest either skipping over the paragraph that begins "In his extremely bitter moments..." and continuing reading at "To be fair..." or skipping the chapter entirely.

Jack Harkness is not without his vices - does, in fact, have enough to fill several books - but he has never been a gambling man. Yes, he’s endured his fair share of ribbing but at the end of the day he has nothing to regret. His money is safe in the capable hands of last night’s exotic dancer and Jack is sated in his/hers/undecided entity’s bed, having proven the capability of those hands among other body parts.

Getting to leave that bed and watch the Doctor stumble around, still _metabolizing the effects_ of last night’s hypervodka - a fancy term that Jack has long ago translated to mean _hangover_ , even if Time Lords are far too advanced to get sloshed, let alone become ill from said impossible drunkenness - and shouting for Rose is just an added bonus.

“She didn’t do anything wrong,” he mutters in between panicked calls, striding down the corridor of the casino holding cells, Jack a step behind. “Stupid, paranoid apes. See something you can’t understand and you immediately assume it’s foul play. But when a bunch of flatulent aliens infiltrate your government you just roll over, don’t you?” He pauses to aim a misjudged kick at a heavy metal trash bin, stubbing his toe in the process. “Rose!”

“Doc, calm down.” Jack grasps the Doctor’s upper arm to steady him as he sways, glaring balefully at the bin.

“You should’ve been keeping an eye on her, Jack!”

“Bit hard, when she was hanging out at the card table with you all night,” says Jack, the retort coming out more petulant than he intends.

“And warning us about this casino’s stringent policies would’ve been too much for your limited brain capacity, would it? Surely you’ve been here before, Mr. Time Agent.”

“I don’t gamble,” Jack reminds him.

“Of course you don’t,” the Doctor scoffs. “You’ll have sex with anything that moves but you don’t bloody gamble. Glad to see you’ve got your priorities in order, Captain. Willing to put Rose at risk just to get your nightly fix.”

“I’m sure she’s fine.”

“They could be doing anything to her! Young, pretty blonde. So trusting, too. She’d follow someone right off a cliff if they said they needed help.” The Doctor’s eyes flash and he ups his pace. “ _Rose!_ ”

“She’s not a child, Doc.”

“She’s still my _responsibility_ , Jack. I promised her mother I’d keep her safe. Not that you’d know anything about that.”

Jack doesn’t disagree. It’s a point of pride with him, not allowing anyone or anything to tie him down (figuratively speaking, he’s all for a bit of bondage) and when you get right down to it, responsibility is another word for just that, an obligation to be kept at arm’s length so that no one can make you feel guilty for not living up to it.

Responsibility does not entail wrapping the person you are responsible for in a bone-breaking embrace and burying your nose in their neck, muttering platitudes and reassurances and threats to anyone who would dare to harm a hair on their head even when anyone who might have caused them harm has been incapacitated by the _responsibility_ herself a good ten minutes before they arrived.

“I’m fine, Doctor. Really.” One hand still clasped tightly in the Doctor’s, Rose stirs her tea with difficulty.

She wiggles the fingers that are clasped in his and he lifts the mug from her free hand, leading her over to sit and placing it on the table in front of her along with a plate of chocolate biscuits. Jack reaches for one and the Doctor glares at him, pushing the plate toward Rose’s side of the table.

“Stop that.” Rose slaps at his hand. “‘S not his fault I got thrown in there anymore than it’s yours.”

From the dejected expression that flashes across the Doctor’s face, hastily covered with pointless bluster over human tells and the unrivalled Time Lord Poker Face, Jack knows Rose has struck at the heart of the problem. Still she plays along, nibbling at her lower lip and musing over what other secrets he could possibly be hiding.

“I know your favorite color, Doctor. I don’t see how anything can get more highly-classified than that.”

The Doctor grumbles back at her - some witty, flirty repartee - and Jack loses himself in their sexual tension-filled conversation. He is safe and Rose is safe and the Doctor is safe, their frenzied retreat will soon fade to nothing more than another tale of their wacky hijinks, and it’s easy to forget what a dangerous game they play.

Because there are days where they don’t all come out safe and sound. There are days when not everyone lives.

There are days, in fact, when a lot of people die.

These are the nights when Jack will brew an extra-strong cup of coffee and sit drinking it in front of some obnoxious comedy or a movie so rife with explosions it’s impossible to take seriously, anything to erase the darkness clawing at the edges of his mind, the nightmares that will come if he succumbs to it. The muffled cries he hears at night - not of ecstasy but of pain and fear and unadulterated terror - are testament to their inevitability.

And all Jack can do, coward that he is, is sit and wait for the screaming to stop.

They will join him sometimes, afterwards, the Doctor’s arm draped loosely over Rose’s shoulders or her arm twined around his waist, tea and snacks in hand. Without a word, Jack will shift over. Rose will offer him a biscuit and he will mumble his thanks and take a bite. None of them will discuss what has transpired - the Doctor and Rose because they must have exchanged their soppy condolences a half-dozen times by now and Jack for fear of jinxing it.

As if, by acknowledging that _today_ they are all here, safe and sound, _tomorrow_ they won’t be. Jack’s sense - the part that is used to being on the winning side all the time, every time - it’s nothing but a childish worry but on nights like these, when all he can do is stare listlessly at the screen, it’s a very real possibility. This is a high-stakes game they play and more you offer up to the eternal dealer, Fate, the more you will lose in the end. The only question is how long your winning streak will last.

(Funny how poetic a man can get on two hours sleep.)

Jack’s goes on for six months and when he dies - for real this time, not some elaborate prank or a botched execution - it is as a hero. Surprisingly, this consoles him.

When he wakes up again, he is safe and sound. This is the worst part.

In his more bitter moments, Jack wishes the Doctor and Rose had stayed. Did they have to be so selfish? It’s not like he would have minded if they wanted to have a good, celebratory shag on the console. Was he so dispensable that they couldn’t be bothered to wait an extra two seconds? He gave them everything, let them worm their insidious way into his heart, and had received nothing but room and board in return (and not even a refund on the security deposit).

In his extremely bitter ones, he wishes they’d died with him. Maybe then he would have stayed dead.

He still can’t, no matter how hard he tries. He picks fights in bars and ventures into the most dangerous centuries, plays a pivotal role in the universe’s most violent rebellions (under the pseudonym John Smith just to see if the Doctor will catch on). He falls in love and pulls the trigger himself but he still has to get up in the morning and bring flowers to their graves, to go to the nursing home and feed applesauce to a woman who can no longer remember his name.

To be fair, he did run away twenty years ago. He can understand why the Doctor loves it so much.

It’s the coward’s way out and he doesn’t deny it when they rail at him for some accidental-on purpose offense. When the only other option is to watch your lover fade, hair graying and mind blurring around the edges while he remains whole and healthy, he’ll take cowardice any day. He lets the vase or the picture frame or the priceless family heirloom crack above his head and he wears the cuts proudly till they heal up two minutes later.

This is one thing he and the Doctor do not share and, in between filing incident reports and defying death and ordering takeout, Jack wonders what it would feel like to render him, the man who has a caustic rejoinder for everything, completely speechless, cradling his cheek where a bruise is slowly forming. Even with all the resources of Torchwood at his disposal, however, it is difficult to find a man who doesn’t want to be found, near impossible when that man has the ability to travel anywhere in time and space with no more than the flick of a switch. Gwen and Tosh tiptoe around the issue when he reveals the rationale behind his early-morning forays into the files labeled _Doctor Who?_ ; Owen calls it an obsession. They only know the legend, the mysterious man in his magical blue box who saves the universe time and again, ignorant of what he’s like before his morning cuppa or how he looks at Rose when he thinks that no one’s looking.

It is the same look he catches while out fetching pad thai two weeks later. Rose’s hair is cut shorter, her makeup is more subdued, but she is still undeniably Rose Tyler. As for the man sitting across from her, one hand clasped tightly in Rose’s, the other popping pieces of muffin into his mouth, that man with his pinstripes and his trenchcoat and his hair - dear Lord, his _hair_ \- is undeniably the Doctor.

And he’d thought the leather jacket was good.

Jack’s limbs are working before he has given them permission to, ducking between mopeds and taxi cabs, takeout containers spilling from his hands. A few people swear at him and there’s the sound of crunching metal as bumper meets bumper. More people swear at him but Jack couldn’t answer even if he tried, _DoctorDoctorDoctor_ playing a ceaseless loop in his mind. Somewhere in that loop, he makes a mental note to send a crew out to fix this up tomorrow, he’ll write it off as another alien car chase.

Hey, at least there’s an alien involved.

“Jack?” Her attention caught by the myriad swerving and cursing Rose looks up, eyes meeting his. “Oh, my god. Jack!”

She runs to him, the Doctor only a few steps behind, throws her arms around him. She’s mumbling about how she never thought she’d see him again and how much she missed him and how she’s so sorry, she didn’t mean to, it was all the Bad Wolf and Jack can feel her tears soaking into the shoulder of his jacket.

“Shh,” he murmurs, presses a light kiss to the top of her head, almost laughing aloud at the Doctor’s fierce glare.

“Jack,” says the Doctor, somewhat stiffly.

“Doctor.” He has it all planned out: what he will say and what he will do, a long-neglected _thanks, Doc_ for all the years of loneliness and loss that have eaten away at him nearly as much as this bitter gratitude. But here is Rose, loosening her hold, wiping her eyes and beaming up at him. Here is the Doctor with the same frown lines bracketing his mouth and when Rose turns back to him, intertwining her fingers with his, he leans down for a kiss - to her lips and nose and cheeks and chin which Jack observes with all the pride of a mother on their child’s first day of school - before deeming himself satisfied. Here they all are, safe and sound, and all Jack can manage is, “New haircut?”

Ever obtuse, the Doctor can only stare for a moment, left eyebrow almost disappearing into his fringe before his lips crack in a smile.

“Something like that.”

It’s an answer as ambiguous as the Doctor himself, a response that anyone with the barest shred of sanity would question. Jack doesn’t question it. The slightest shade of insanity is just another vice he’s accrued over the last few years. For now, he will accept Rose’s offer of a coffee, will perch himself between them and lean forward on his hands, eyes wide in expectation.

“So . . . how did it happen?”

For now, Jack will enjoy his winning streak.


	23. Neighbors IV - Shameless Self-Insertion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As the title suggests, this chapter involves a self-insertion of yours truly. Like many things I write, it is pure crack and not meant to be taken seriously. ;)
> 
> If this isn’t your thing, I also have next chapter written (made of 100% Doctor/Rose fluff) and will be posting that tomorrow.

Liz is not a brave person. Any version of extreme - where the prefix is substituted for an  _X_ \- sports or death-defying rollercoasters she views as a cruel and unusual form of punishment. She has no piercings or tattoos of any kind, not for any fear of marring her pasty-white skin but because she will inevitably start screaming when they take out the antiseptic. When confronted with a spider, her preferred method of attack is to chuck a large book at it from several feet away before discarding of its' eight-legged carcass with several layers of paper towels. While this batch of alien invaders were arachnoid in nature, they were also twenty feet tall. Not so easy to squash with Stephen King's  _It_.

Nevertheless, Liz is ninety-nine percent sure that this is the most amazing thing to ever happen in the history of amazing things.

The Doctor and Rose Tyler are leaning over the console, noses nearly brushing, grinning at each other like adorable idiots, and having blatant eye sex. Like the  _Fear Her_ eye-sex but a million times more ophthalmologically sexy. Also, she was sitting aboard the TARDIS, separated from the alien invasion by an impenetrable wooden door, and the Doctor had promised to help get the rest of her family to safety.

But mostly the eye sex part.

It was one thing to marvel over fic and fanart, to analyze gifsets and inflections  _ad nauseum_ , quite another to watch it unfold before your very eyes.

The Doctor waggles his eyebrows.

Liz presses a fist to her mouth to muffle a  _squee_.

Rose smiles a tongue-touched smile.

Liz stuffs both hands into her coat pockets to prevent herself from smooshing their faces together.

"So," says the Doctor. "Where to?"

_The bedroom,_ Rose will say, sultry and seductive.

_The library?_ Rose will ask, snuggling into his chest.  _We never finished that chapter last night._

_Let's get some chips,_ Rose will suggest.  _'S your turn to pay._

"Liz?" asks the Doctor.

"What's up?"

The Doctor raises his left eyebrow. "Where to?"

"You mentioned your husband works nearby?" Rose prompts.

"Yeah," says Liz. She gestures vaguely toward the far wall of the TARDIS. "He's twenty miles . . . that way."

"Right. Twenty miles  _that way_ it is, then." Striding purposefully around the console, the Doctor begins flipping important-looking switches and big buttons of varying colors. Rose bends down to peer at the console screen, pressing a few important-looking buttons of her own, and Liz feels a surge of something like maternal affection. Her OTP was so beautiful.

"Thing is. . . ."

"What?" The Doctor screeches to a halt, mouth hanging halfway open in expectation of further instructions.

". . . I think he'll be OK. He's tough. Plus, he works in a machine shop so there's lots of big, lethal tools just hanging around. He should be able to fend them off for a little while."

"That makes sense," says Rose diplomatically. "Is there someone close by, then? Someone in more imminent danger?"

The Doctor beams. "Good thinking, Rose."

"No," says Liz. "I just think we should wait it out, you know? What's the hurry?"

"Erm," Rose exchanges a glance with the Doctor, "well, there are the massive spider aliens right outside."

"Acromantulas," corrects the Doctor, coming around the console again to crouch next to Rose. His hand rests on the small of her back. "And they're bent on destroying the world as you know it, Liz."

"I know that. But most aliens are, aren't they? And you two beat them all every time. Which is amazing, don't get me wrong. You're both incredible. Seriously incredible. You just might want to change your strategy a bit. Like now. Instead of just charging out there like the stuff of legend, you could smoke them out, you know? Call their bluff."

"Of giant spiders," the Doctor clarifies, his right eyebrow joining the other at the top of his forehead.

"Yep." Liz nods seriously. "They might not be as powerful as you think they are. If you just hold off, they'll be forced to - to. . . ."

"Drain your loved ones of their bodily fluids?" Rose smacks the Doctor's arm, murmuring  _rude_ , and he casts her an injured look. " _Oww_."

"I told you, they're tough," Liz repeats. "And in the meantime, instead of worrying about the world in peril, you guys could be doing something else. Like baking cookies."

"Why would we want to bake cookies?" asks the Doctor. His eyebrows have abandoned his fringe to rest somewhere around the bridge of his nose, carving thoughtful furrows into his forehead. Liz half-expects Rose to reach up and smooth them away with the pad of her thumb and is slightly disappointed when she doesn't.

"Oh, no, that was just a suggestion," Liz explains. "You could do plenty of other stuff, too. Like have a movie marathon. Or give each other massages. Or have crazy-hot sex against a wall. Trust me, it'll be awesome."

Again the Doctor's brows rise, not in skepticism this time but in consideration. His hand moves from the small of Rose's back to the top of her hip, tracing idle circles against the skin where her sweater rides up. Rose sighs and leans into his touch, the hand resting on the Doctor's arm trailing upwards to tug at his tie.

The TARDIS judders sharply as one of the Acromantulas sideswipes it with one sequoia-sized leg and the Doctor and Rose are sent sprawling to the ground in a tangle of limbs while Liz clutches at a coral strut to stay upright.

"Right." Rose's cheeks are flushed and she accept Liz's hand up with a grateful smile. "Might want to take care of those lot first."

Looking as though it pains him greatly, the Doctor hums in agreement.

This is the point, Liz knows, where should take an enormous machine-gun from one of her heretofore unmentioned transdimensional pockets. Like what Rose had in  _Stolen Earth_ but made for killing twenty-foot spider aliens that threaten the fluffiness of her OTP. This is where Liz should help the Doctor and Rose save the world, as BAMF-ily as Rose Tyler ever would.

The Doctor lands them in the midst of all the madness and offers Rose his hand. Liz smiles a tiny, tender, shipper-smile.

" _Allons-y_ , Rose Tyler!"

They dash out the door and Liz waits only a second before following after. She may not be Rose Tyler but she is a person who writes fan fiction about Rose Tyler and this would make an awesome story.


	24. Pet Names

Rose can deal with change.

An army of plastic mannequins come to life and a nine hundred-year-old alien who travels time and space in a phone box? Count her in.

The alien - the same several-times centenarian alien, in fact - not only has the ability to cheat death and alter his entire physical form but chooses a form just like one of her  _pretty boys_  and takes on her accent? All in a day's work.

A new man who she falls in love with a little bit more every day, two parallel lines growing closer, fraction by fraction, for infinitum till he declares his intentions over a stovetop of sizzling pancakes? Beat you to the bedroom.

But when said alien lover greets her with a morning cuppa and a  _morning, darling_ , brushing his lips across hers, she chokes, both on her first sip and the requisite reply.

Scalding hot liquid spills down her front, seeping under the thin fabric of her nightshirt - the Doctor's favorite blue buttondown - and hot tears spring to her eyes. Vaguely, she registers the Doctor patting her back with one hand, running the other frantically along her bare arms and legs to check for any new burns, bumps, or bruises.

"What did you say?" she gasps out, once the hacking coughs have subsided. Maybe she's misheard, maybe  _darling_ is just some weird alien term that the TARDIS refuses to translate and he'll just look at her like she's mad if she responds in kind: the way a human would to their human boyfriend with  _darling_ or  _sweetheart_ or any term of endearment she may have used for Mickey or Jimmy in years gone by.

Absorbed in the examination of a nick on her kneecap, the Doctor doesn't answer and, impatient, Rose tugs at his hair with her free hand. Instantly his head swings up, so fast he must get whiplash, eyes wide in concern.

_What's wrong? Did I hurt you?_

"No. Doctor. . . ." She jerks her chin from his grasp, snatching the flashing and whirring sonic from his hand, ready for use in diagnosis of any number of nonexistent conditions that can only be treated with cuddles and bubble baths. Normally she'd humor him, but he does this after every close call - their last only two days ago - and Rose's curiosity wins out over her tolerance. (She'll let him freak out the next time she skins her knee on the grating.)

A flick of her finger and the screwdriver is silent again; Rose sticks it into the pocket of the buttondown, leveling herself up from the kitchen chair and away from the Doctor when he reaches for it. She pokes her tongue out from between her teeth, teasing him, but this does nothing to alleviate his crinkled brow and worried frown.

_Just one scan, Rose. Please._

"You called me  _darling_."

_Yes._ He pauses, arm half-extended, obviously reluctant to grapple with her for the device when her health is in question.  _Is that a problem?_

Rose shrugs. "'S just new, is all." She retreats a few more paces so that the kitchen island is between them. "You've never done that before."

_Thought I'd try it out._

"Oh."

Concern over her lack of response winning out over that for potential third-degree burns, the Doctor tugs nervously at one ear.  _That is a thing with humans of your era, isn't it? Pet names?_

"Yeah," Rose agrees. "Yeah, it is."

_Good. Great. Molto bene._ He nods, bouncing on the balls of his feet, and offers Rose a crooked smile.  _So. Darling it is, then?_

"What?"

_Or sweetheart,_ he amends quickly.  _If you didn't like_ darling _, that was second choice. Then, ehm - actually, it might be best . . . yes, definitely best. This is a decision we should make together. Hang on, I've got a list right here._ Delving into the transdimensional pocket of his dressing gown, he unearths a few pointy and metallic bits and bobs, a half-empty bag of Jelly Babies, and a pair of Rose's knickers before unfolding a sheet of notepaper and setting it on the counter in front of him.

Rose scoots around to read the words right-side up, and is immediately grateful that she didn't go for a second cup of tea; it would only have met the same fate as the first. Untitled, the combination of English and Gallifreyan crammed into every spare space on the page make the subject matter clear enough. She'd never really thought about it before - he was the Doctor and she was Rose, that was that - but, blinking down at the list, ranging from the innocuous  _honey_ to the risque  _sex kitten_ and everywhere in between, doesn't doubt that the Doctor has an encyclopedia on the subject stashed away somewhere.

Pen marks bleed through the paper from the opposite side and she flips the page over.

Several encyclopedias.

_I'm overwhelming you, aren't I? I'm sorry. There were just so many, in the twenty-first century alone, and you know me._ He smiles nervously, tugging at the opposite ear this time.  _Went a bit overboard. But just choose the one you like best for now and we can change it whenever you want._

"Alright. . . ." He looks so excited at the thought of calling her  _pookie_ or  _sugar bear_  that Rose can't bring herself to burst his bubble just yet. This is simply the newest in a series of resolutions, a sampling of their slow path, all of which end with the Doctor bouncing off the walls, fiddling with the appliances or, one memorable occasion, grafting turbo-thrusters to her cousin's tricycle.

Under the pretense of a girl's day with Shareen, Rose snuck out to attend the christening for the baby sister of that same cousin two months later. When she returned, the pale pink invite was sitting on the jumpseat and the Doctor had disappeared underneath the console. Undoubtedly still stinging over the Schwinn experiment, it was addressed only  _Rose_ (with a blank space for a guest)rather than the  _Rose and Doctor_ that had become so common as news of their relationship spread and the eternal question became not  _Doctor who?_ but  _Doctor, when are you going to put a ring on that finger?_ , one not made any easier to answer when blushing brides all but shoved their bouquets into Rose's hands, shooting the Doctor looks full of meaning.

"I just thought you wouldn't want to," she said to his shoelaces.

_I always want to._ Even with his face obscured, she could hear the pout in his voice.  _I just want you to be happy, Rose._

It's his constant refrain, an equation of happiness with humanity - a guaranteed date on Friday nights and a co-signer on the mortgage - and of regret with a time-traveling alien in a blue police box. Sweet as it is, his martyrdom can be equally irritating. Much as the Doctor may want to credit his questionable charm, the choice to come aboard had been hers and hers alone. Infinitely more appealing than the second shift at Henrik's and Mickey clutching at her ankles was this strange new netherworld of near-death experiences and real-world uses for her gymnastics trophy (collecting dust underneath her bed even as the TARDIS door shut behind her), maybe with a bit of hand-holding along the way.

If Rose were one for  _darlings_ , she would have refused him then and there.

Not that she minds spending a morning - an afternoon, an evening, the wee hours where they lie facing each other, discussing the merits of the Harry Potter franchise versus Lord of the Rings - lazing in bed with the Doctor. There are days, too, where they don't go out looking for trouble but only for chips - plain-old twenty-first century London chips, doused in vinegar that the Doctor turns up his nose at - that they secret away in his transdimensional pockets for a matinee at the movie theater. She accepts his outstretched hand, fingers wiggling animatedly, when he offers a dance at cousin Jess's wedding (and glares at the handsy groomsman over her shoulder) because at the end of the day their house is bigger on the inside and home is anywhere they want it to be. It's a perfect balance - a hand to hold, sweat-slicked from another close call - and one Rose wouldn't dream of upsetting with the added weight of white pickets and pet names.

He repeats it again now and, when he receives no response, knocks his hip against her own, a playful gesture that belies his anxious expression.

_Rose?_

"Of course I'm happy, Doctor. 'S just. . . ." Wrinkles bracket his mouth as well as his brows now and they leave Rose feeling far guiltier than such a situation warrants. Racking her brain, she struggles to come up with some sort of conciliatory response (preferably one which won't conclude with the choice of a name on the exhaustive list in front of her), but all she can come up with is, "We're not really darling  _people_ , are we?"

_Well, no. Not if you don't want to be._ The Doctor concedes her point. _But that's why you have the list! Mickey used to call you_ babe _. Would you like that?_ His tone is filled with false cheer, his smile stretched a bit too wide.

"No," says Rose, without preamble. She doesn't mean for it to come out so harshly, hard and uncompromising, but his incomprehension - purposeful or not - is grating on her nerves.

Before Mickey,  _babe_ was Jimmy's name for her. To be more accurate, it was the name for when she caught him groping another groupie (she  _came onto_ me _, babe_ ) or he came home sloshed after another layoff ( _babe, you know I could never be a slave to the_ man). No more a term of endearment than  _bitch_ or  _nag_  (his backup plan if she didn't give the right answer the first time), she'd thought it Mickey's way of breaking up with her, only a fortnight into her relationship.

The Doctor would call it a Pavlovian response, but the Doctor knows nothing about it. The little she's told him can be covered in five minutes or less no matter how much he hashes and rehashes it, the Oncoming Storm a foreboding shadow in his eyes and that's more than enough to deal with. A paradox caused by his ensuring Jimmy never makes it home one drunken night is more attention than the arse deserves on the best of days.

Still, the hand resting against the small of her back feels clammy and cold with the fear that he's done some irreparable wrong, and a reflexive apology rises to her lips. He kisses it away, tracing his lips from her jaw to her ear which he gives a soft nip, both a refusal to grant forgiveness because none is needed and a promise of clemency for any and all future wrongdoings (with the possible exception of taking the last slice of banana bread for a midnight snack without telling him).

_So,_ he says, once satisfied that the faintest feeling of guilt has been assuaged,  _babe's out, then?_

Rose nods. The corner of the list is curled up and she tears a piece of it off, rolling the tiny bit of paper between her forefinger and thumb till the Doctor captures her lowered chin in his own long digits.

_The rest are, too, aren't they?_

When Rose nods again he snatches the list up from the counter and stuffs it back into his pocket to be replaced by a few shortbread biscuits a second later. Speckled with a few spots of strawberry lip gloss, he pronounces them none the worse for wear and offers one to Rose with a bright smile that nearly blinds her to the disappointed slump of his shoulders. Were it not for her master's in Doctor mannerisms, Rose would have missed it herself.

"It  _was_  a sweet idea, Doctor. Pet names . . . they just aren't my thing."

_It's fine, Rose._ The Doctor takes a bite of his biscuit, spraying crumbs.  _You don't have to explain._

"It wasn't with Mickey, either," she adds quickly, compelled to justify her actions beyond those of a cold commitaphobe. " _Babe_ and that. Was just, I dunno - reflex with him. Made it feel more real - what we had. And I loved him, I did, but you and me, Doctor, what we have . . . it's so much more than that.  _Sweetheart_ or  _cupcake_ or - or. . . ."

_Hot lips?_ he suggests, brows waggling. Briefly, Rose considers enlightening him as to the names she's heard through the thin walls of the flat (and how similar they are to his current compilation), but isn't up to coaxing a pouty Doctor through the door next time they stop by the Powell Estates for a visit.

"Exactly. We're not any of those things, Doctor. We're the Stuff of Legend not some stuffy old married couple. I'm not your  _baby_ , I'm your plus-one."

One crumb-coated finger halfway to his mouth, the Doctor is silent for a second, lips pursed together in thought.  _Plus-one?_

"Yeah," says Rose, a bit nervous herself now. "You know, on Platform One? Prime seats for the end of the world?"

_I remember._ He smiles.  _I like it. My plus-one,_ he murmurs as if trying it on for size, and he moves his mouth to her jaw again. And, swiping his tongue across the shell of her ear,  _My darling plus-one._

"Oi!" Rose pokes him in the ribs, earning a pained squeak in return and he catches her hand in his, pressing soft, supplicatory kisses along her fingertips.

_Right, right. Sorry. Check back in twenty years?_

"What?"

_When we're an old, married couple,_ he explains.  _But not stuffy. Never stuffy. We may go gray, Rose Tyler, but we'll never stop running, you and me._ Then, considering,  _But I do still reserve the right to call you_ darling  _\- oh, and to tell kids to get off my lawn._ He grins toothily at her, eyes alight.  _Always wanted to do that._

Rose laughs. "This your way of proposing, then?"

It's no more ridiculous than any of his other proposals and less so than some. Marriage ceremonies have, in fact, become something of a routine, whether it be the Doctor sliding the gold band he keeps handy onto her finger, surrounded by marital law peacekeepers or stumbling over unpronounceable vows, Rose in a poofy white dress and the Doctor his pinstripes, the priest with an executioner's blade tucked into his belt. Sometimes they spend their  _wedding night_ incarcerated in a honeymoon suite where they have fun with the jacuzzi and the hundred-setting heart-shaped bed and the new Mr. and Mrs. Tyler embark in the morning, sated.

These are the parts they leave out in their verbal slideshows (along with the hours spent in infirmaries and shag-or-die situations in prison cells); her mum would only insist on a wedding -  _a_ real _wedding, Rose, you know those barmy Martian ones don't count_ \- if they did, another white dress and another set of vows. Rose would agree to it, of course - when Mum got an idea in her head, there was no stopping her - and the Doctor would, too. They will parrot the words they're supposed to say when they made their vows long ago: not  _for better or worse_ but  _better with two_ ,  _forever_ instead of  _as long as we both shall live_.

But the Doctor's unhesitating  _yes_ is pretty good, too.


	25. Pet's Names

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a while since I've written Nine, so here's a bit of Nine/Rose fluff for you guys. Also puppies - and who doesn't love that?

The Doctor isn't a dog person.

At least he doesn't  _think_ he's a dog person. He's been in this body only a few months and has only recently determined on how he likes his tea let alone the pushy, pint-sized canine who, when not busy yapping at him, engages itself in wriggling under the console, coating his ship in fur that the creature doesn't even have the common courtesy to apologize for.

K9 would have. Then again, K9 also had no fur to shed and compacted his waste product into neat little odorless cubes. (If he can track down Sarah-Jane again, maybe he can convince her to trade.) It's no wonder none of his previous regenerations ever took a pet on board.

Then again, none of them ever had to face saying  _no_ to Rose Tyler. Her puppy-dog eyes were more devastating than those animals to whom the nomenclature belonged.

 _I never had any pets growing up,_ she said.  _Did you?_

"Nope."

Leant against the chainlink fence surrounding the laboratory, the Doctor cast a wary eye over the assembly of overexcited canines surrounding his companion. He was all for shutting down another sadistic animal-testing facility (run entirely by humans this one, a race whose constant capacity for both goodness and cruelty never failed to amaze him), but this left the question of where their several-dozen slobbery charges would go next. From the way Rose was hugging each and every one as though she never wanted to be parted, and the not-so-surreptitious looks she kept sending his way, she no doubt thought the TARDIS a suitable home for her new friends.

He should've just let her keep Adam.

 _The council didn't allow animals,_ Rose continued, frustratingly unperturbed by his monosyllabic response. _Something about making too much of a mess, but maintenance was shit anyway._ Her brows drew together in annoyance at this childhood grievance but then a dribbling labrador loped over to her and promptly drenched her face in drool before dashing away again.

_Mum let me have a goldfish for a little while, but he died. Got stuck in the water filter._

The Doctor snorted. "That's Earth fish for you. Rather go belly-up than take a chance. You want something hardy, I can take you to the planet Nemo. Breeds the best fish in the universe. 'Course, it's mostly for eating, but I'm sure we could convince them to part with a couple."

 _That's alright,_ said Rose.  _Kinda grew out of them after Buddy. Bit . . . wet, I s'pose._ She wiped at her face with her sleeve, coming off with a patina of dog drool just as a terrier braced itself on her chest, tiny tongue lolling. Rose laughed, hoisting the puppy up under its' front paws to be eye-to-eye.  _Oh, aren't you a sweetheart? Yes, you are._

"You named your fish Buddy?" asked the Doctor.

_Ooh, and you've got these little white splotches on your paws, too. Just like little socks. Is that your name, Socks? Is it, sweetheart? What do you think, Doctor?_

Not sure if he was more annoyed that Rose was growing attached to the dog - he's sat through enough feel-good films to know that naming the pooch gives it tacit permission to follow the reluctant protagonist home and next thing you know there's a montage with said reluctant protagonist playing Frisbee and checking for fleas, going on long walks with the optimistic protagonist/Love Interest™ - or the monopolization of her attention that this attachment caused (peevishness only increased by his inability to determine the difference), the Doctor only repeated, "Buddy?"

_Hmm?_

"Your fish."

 _Oh. Oh, yeah,_ Rose ducked her head, cheeks going endearingly pink. _Thought if I proved I could take care of a fish, then they'd grant me special permission or something. I took all of these pictures of 'im with Mum's Polaroid, him swimming and me cleaning his bowl and stuff, was gonna send them to the council. I was a bit. . . ._

"Creative?" offered the Doctor at the same time Rose said  _delusional_. She laughed, a flash of teeth and tongue that made the Doctor's hearts skip a beat and his legs go weak.

Which made saying  _no_ when Rose asked to bring the newly-christened Socks along with them to Nemo (if she couldn't have a dog, the Doctor reasoned, maybe a fish would placate her) much harder than it should have been.

_Why not?_

Because she'd not even lived here six months (five months, two weeks, one day, eight hours, and twenty-six minutes) and not only were companions only invested with the authority to invite others aboard after two years ( _you offer an IRA, too?_  asked Rose) but he had bent the rules for her already with Adam. And a dog was a different matter, entirely: Section X, subparagraph F of the Companion's Handbook, discussing Limits of Domesticity which had already been breached with her puffy, pink throw pillows in the media room.

 _Well, I never would've if you'd_ said _. 'Sides, I don't see you complaining about 'domestics' when I bring you your cuppa every night._

Because the TARDIS was a delicate piece of machinery and he wasn't about to give a dog the run of it, wandering about and weeing wherever the mood struck.

_You're one to talk - smacking her with that mallet anytime you get a bit cranky._

Because while yes, Socks was certainly adorable, a shelter or a rescue would be a far better home for him than a bigger-on-the-inside spaceship whose inhabitants laughed in the face of death and danger on a daily basis.

That one stumped her and, for a few exhilarating seconds, the Doctor thought he may have won. Unfortunately, Socks chose that moment to request a belly rub, grinning up at Rose, forelegs waving in the air and the back extended across her lap. Even from here, the Doctor could see where portions of the dog's fur had been shaved away, and a few healing injection marks; he purposefully averted his eyes from Rose's when she looked back up at him but it couldn't drown out her voice, wobbly and wavering, that sent his hearts plummeting to somewhere around his ankles.

_Please, Doctor? He's all alone, too._

He hopes his next regeneration is blind and deaf; it might interfere with the whole  _savior-of-the-universe_  lark, but at least it will make refusing Rose Tyler marginally easier.

"I find a puddle anywhere on this ship and it's into the vortex with you," the Doctor threatens through a mouthful of pliers. Rose is usually his self-designated gopher, hand hovering uncertainly over the open toolkit (bright blue with slate-gray trim, she insisted he buy it last time they were in B&Q), passing along the  _pair of orange tweezer-things_ or the  _blue thingamabob_  while wondering aloud why he can't just use his sonic to fix everything, anyway.

But Rose has been on the phone with shelters for the past forty-eight minutes, sorting out temporary homes for the twenty-seven newly-made strays. After seven of these minutes, the Doctor determined that any potential attack would be forestalled by her retinue of guard dogs (who, if they didn't bite, would at least stand a chance of drowning the assailant with slaver) and retreated, not a little sullenly, to the TARDIS. Inexplicably, Socks had followed. Were it not for the thought of Rose's reaction - wounded eyes and a pouty lower lip to boot - the Doctor would have shut him in one of the old storage rooms already, muting his shrill yips and clicking claws.

The Doctor's head swings up, scanning the room, completely devoid of yapping and clacking. Racking his brain, he can't recall seeing hide or hair of their new passenger for at least five minutes.

Impenetrable or not, there's a plentitude of danger to be found aboard the ship that any jeopardy-friendly companion (up to and including his current pink-and-yellow one) can fall face-first into within five minutes. (On Rose's third day, he had to rush her to the infirmary after she pricked her finger on the one poisonous-to-humans plant in the entirety of the TARDIS gardens.) For a dog, it must be half that.

And for this dog? He wouldn't trust him thirty seconds alone in the TARDIS.

"Even the swimming pool." He crouches to peek underneath the console, searching for a flash of white paws and black snout. Rose will be upset if he lets her new pet electrocute himself and an upset Rose isn't one who can be reasoned with when he tries to explain that  _no_ , he can't take her home because their new guest irreparably damaged the TARDIS's time rotor with his prehumous urination so how does the forty-third century sound instead?

Paranoid, the Doctor taps a few buttons on the dashboard, heaving a sigh of relief when everything comes up normal. He sets the default to 2006, just in case.

"You'd better man a mop there, Socks," he adds, straightening and wrinkling his nose at the pseudo-rhyme. "Don't keep deadweights on board, me. Just ask Rose."

_Ask me what?_

Masking the worst of his start with an impressive-looking flick of a switch, the Doctor watches Rose from the corner of his eye as she heads up the ramp to join him at the console, Socks trotting along beside her.

" _There_ you are!" He points accusingly down at the dog who perks up his ears at the censure. "Snuck out, did you, you little bugger? Try that in the vortex and you know where you'll end up?"

Socks tips his head to the side, making a querulous noise in his throat, mocking him.

"Tons of tiny, furry atoms, that's where." The Doctor answers his own question, flapping his arms to demonstrate the immensity of the hypothetical discombobulation. "Scattered  _all_ through time and space and you'll never be able to whiz on another fire hydrant again. How's that?"

Socks barks.

The Doctor glares.

Brows raised, Rose's eyes flick between him and Socks, expression caught somewhere between amusement and, for whatever reason, something close to regret.  _I'm sure he didn't mean to worry you,_ she says with a half-smile that is sorely lacking in a peek of pink tongue.

"Worried?" The Doctor snorts, affecting an overly indignant tone that Rose is sure to see through. "I wasn't  _worried_." When this fails to produce the usual quick-witted retort or (at the very least) a half-stifled giggle, he drops the act. "Alright, what's wrong?"

Rose sighs.  _The police are here._

"All those parking tickets finally come back to haunt you?" He  _tsk_ s at her, frowning in mock-sternness. "Rose Tyler, hardened criminal. Who'd have thought?"

 _Nah, that's Mickey. Always running out of money to feed the meter._  Her lips twitch and the Doctor gives himself a few points for that. He rolls his eyes to the ceiling, muttering something about idiots who don't deserve driver's licenses (here, Rose is supposed to interject that he's one to talk, dropping her off twelve months later than planned) but, nibbling at her lip, she doesn't appear to be listening.

 _Just came to get the psychic paper,_ she explains.  _The rescue's on their way, but in the meantime . . . thought it'd be best to look legit. One of them's already giving me shifty eyes._

"What for?" he demands, disbelieving. How suspecting Rose Tyler of any wrongdoing isn't yet illegal on this planet is an absolute mystery to him.

Rose turns her eyes to the floor, swallowing hard.  _Turns out Socks' name is really Rex. He belongs to this guy's niece. He ran away six months ago and this lot must've picked 'im up._ Sensing he is the subject of conversation, Socks paws at her leg and she reaches down to scratch behind his ears.  _He keeps on asking how come's he's following me all over the place, like I'm the one who abducted him._ She abandons her lip, which has started to bleed, in favor of one of the navy strings dangling from her hoodie.

"Maybe we should," the Doctor suggests, a blatant refusal of the easy out she is giving him, anything to take away that pained, kicked-puppy look in her eyes. It's a chivalrous gesture, something he would never have done for any other companion; at the worst he expects a token objection, not Rose's fierce rebuttal.

 _How could you even_ say _that?_

Despite himself, the Doctor flinches and, from the way Rose extends a conciliatory hand (the other still rubbing behind Socks'/Rex's ears), she notices. He imagines his expression must mirror that of the lab dogs, refusing to venture out of their unlocked crates, shying away from human touch, afraid of getting too close and being hurt again. He hates himself for it.

"Fine." Shoulders stiff, he stalks around the control panel, back to her. "Go out there and give  _Rex_ back. See if I care."

He doesn't even look like a  _Rex_. What human with an ounce of sense would saddle their one-stone dog with a name better suited for some savage behemoth? But here he is, trying to find the correlation between  _homo sapiens_ and intelligence, a losing battle in and of itself.

 _He still belongs with his family,_ Rose snaps back.  _I know you're used to just whisking people away with you, but that's not how it works in the real world, alright?_

She slams her way out of the TARDIS, Socks/Rex hot on her heels.

It's another excruciating thirty-four minutes before she returns. Slumped in the jump seat, wiry white hairs clinging to his jumper, he doesn't turn to greet her. It will only hurt more if he does.

"Do you want to go home?"

 _What?_ She doesn't sound angry anymore, just tired, and that only annoys him more.

"It's not a hard question, Rose. Do you. Want to. Go home?"

 _Depends,_ she says.  _Do I have a choice in the matter?_

"You always have a choice," he says stiffly. "I just thought, after today . . . you might want to spend some time with your family. Jackie, Mickey, what's-her-name . . . Shareen."

Pulling a pensive expression Rose doesn't reply, but the look she shoots his way is just a shade too perceptive.

_Can we go to Nemo?_

"What?"

 _Nemo,_ she repeats.  _Can we go there?_

"Why?"

_I wanted to get a fish. You were all on about it a couple hours ago._

But a couple hours ago was before Socks/Rex. Before their argument. Before Rose reminded him that  _home_ would always be back on the Powell Estates and this jaunt through time and space was little more than an extended vacation.

"You don't like fish, Rose."

 _I never said I didn't like 'em,_ Rose corrects.  _Just that they were a bit wet. Thought if we couldn't have Socks, we could have a fishy version of 'im. That is,_ she adds, tongue poking out from between her teeth,  _if it doesn't violate Section Q, paragraph 800 of that handbook or anything._

Hearts soaring, the Doctor can't stop himself from grinning back and quickly sets to work rushing round the console, pushing levers and pressing buttons.

"Your wish is my command."

If he stops, he will have to hug her (that's what they do now, she's made him into a hugger) and he doesn't trust himself to stop at a hug, doesn't trust himself not to kiss her, to bury himself inside her and have her against one of the coral struts, Nemo an afterthought. But she's young and beautiful and so, so good and he's old and bitter, a killer of his own kind; he would make a better Dalek than a boyfriend.

So he offers her a pet fish and all of time and space instead.


	26. Sitting in a Tree

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we're back to Ten/Rose in this chapter. :)
> 
> For anyone sensitive to it, there is some (extremely minor) dubcon kissing between Rose and another character (not the Doctor).

Rose got her cootie shot when she was seven, the chant of  _circle-circle, dot-dot_ an induction into the in-crowd though she didn't know it till Suzanne Winters invited her over to the corner table at lunch. Eagerly Rose joined them, not touching her brown-bagged leftovers as she drank in their matching pink backpacks and sparkly butterfly barrettes, scented gel pens and jelly shoes.

The next two weeks were the best of Rose Tyler's young life. She blew on dandelion fluff and counted the seeds left over to see when she would get married and played MASH to find out who it would be to (Marc Conahan, they would have fifteen kids and live in a mansion in LA).

Then it all fell apart.

**. . .**

_"Zoe!" Rose races down the pavement after her friend. "Hey, Zoe! Wait up!"_

_But Zoe doesn't hear her; she climbs into the back of her mum's car without looking in Rose's direction once. None of them heard her today, not when Mrs. Cormier asked them to split into groups of two and Rose was left paired with Louise Booger-Eater or when she told a joke that no one laughed at but everyone did when Amy told it a minute later. Not even when Suzanne was handing out invitations to her birthday party and everyone got one but Rose. Even Louise Booger-Eater._

_Rose sits down on the ground, the new light-up shoes that she begged her mum to buy sitting sadly in the gutter. She wants to cry, even if it means the older girls will make fun of her._

_"Hey," says Kenny and he takes a seat next to her, "I got the new Spiderman."_

_"Cool," says Rose._

_"My mum said she was making cookies today. An' she said it was OK with her if you came over 's long as it's OK with your mum." He stuffs one hand into his coat pocket and comes out with a crumpled tissue that he holds out to her._

_Rose nods and takes the tissue, wiping her streaming nose. "OK."_

_"She says you can stay for dinner, too, if you want. We're having lasagne." He grins at her and Rose musters a smile back._

_"That sounds fun."_

_She doesn't notice the older girls snickering._

**. . .**

"This doesn't count as breaking-and-entering, does it?" Rose darts a nervous glance across the empty yard, half-expecting an attack dog to come charging round the corner or a laser beam to shoot out of the drainpipe. (This is how she knows it's been too long since their last visit to her mum's where the most she has to worry about is separating out her delicates from her tops and trousers.) Trainers squeaking in the wet grass, the Doctor draws her back against his chest; his chuckle ruffles her hair and she tenses in his hold.

_Relax,_ he says.  _We've broken into Buckingham Palace before, remember?_

"And that's supposed to make me feel better?"

_Well, I doubt we have to worry about retina scans on a treehouse. Besides,_ he adds, tipping her an enormous wink as he hoists himself onto the first rung, made for much smaller feet,  _I want to see if it's bigger on the inside._

He's halfway up the ladder before Rose can think to stop him. No doubt anticipating her reluctance for this adventure in nostalgia, he's worn the blue suit today, the tighter one; it clings to him in a way that can't possibly be legal and Rose has trouble detaching her eyes from his altitude-gaining bum. Three rungs from the top, he pauses to wiggle it enticingly in her direction.

_Coming?_

With a beleaguered sigh, Rose follows.

**. . .**

_When Rose is in a bad mood, her mum likes to ask if she woke up on the wrong side of the bed. Rose can never tell which side is the wrong one (and has tried sleeping on both without any difference either way), but she thinks the rest of her class ought to try switching._

_Suzanne laughs when Rose gives her this advice, but it's a mean laugh, and Rose hears her whispering about it with Zoe and Amy and everyone at snacktime. For the past week, Suzanne has been the only one to talk to Rose and even then it's just to tease her. Everyone else just points and whispers behind their hands, leaving Rose sitting alone with her brown bag, at the table underneath the air vent. Sometimes, Kenny joins her but he's in Mrs. Guilmette's class and they come in later for lunch._

_Rose looks up when a cafeteria tray lands with a clatter in front of her. Chocolate milk splashes out of its' little cardboard container onto the table and Rose's sleeve, but Louise (just Louise now, the_ Booger-Eater  _part has been erased in light of Rose's offense) doesn't even bother to apologize._

_"Stop crying," she says. "You're being a crybaby and no one likes it. Stop it."_

_"Easy for you to say," Rose sniffles. "_ You're _friends with them now. Everyone in class doesn't hate_ you _."_

_Louise rolls her eyes. "Well, if you want us to like you again, stop hanging out with your boyfriend."_

_"Mickey?" But Mickey's four years older than her; lunch and recess are at different times for them and the most she does is wave at him in the halls. When his Gran brings him over this weekend, maybe she can tell him to stop waving?_

_"Not Mickey, stupid," Louise tuts. "Kenny. Marcy Fields said you go off with him_ every day  _after school."_

_"His mum babysits me," says Rose, half-lying._

_"Marcy says you go to his treehouse every day. She says she saw you_ kissing _."_

_"We weren't kissing!" And that isn't a lie at all; once their homework is done and cookies have been eaten, she and Kenny will pore over his newest issues of Batman or Superman or else divide up his Pokemon cards and play against each other. (Never for keepsies, but he always gives her the Vulpix card, anyway.) If it's rainy out, they'll watch some Star Trek reruns and Kenny's mum will talk about how she used to watch these when she was their age._

_But Louise isn't listening. "Rose and Kenny sitting in a tree," she sings, "K-I-S-S-I-N-G. First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes a baby in a baby carriage."_

_Rose excuses herself just as the chorus, led by Louise and Suzanne, starts up again._

**. . .**

"Why does it matter to you, anyway?"

_Everything about you matters to me, Rose._ Content to leave it at that, the Doctor continues to flip through the pile of bent and faded Pokemon cards, left beneath the loose floorboard with old issues of comic books and a box of Hostess cupcakes with an expiration date several years past.

_Ooh, look, a little fox,_ says the Doctor, holding up a card for her inspection.

"Vulpix," says Rose, the name springing automatically to her lips. The Doctor smiles fondly at her and she lifts the top issue from the pile - something about Wolverine from the X-Men - riffling through the pages.

_Bit barbaric, fighting with these, isn't it?_ he wonders aloud.  _Little foxes and lizards and,_ he squints down at Jigglypuff,  _well, whatever this one is. And they just get sucked back into some little ball when you're done with them?_

"Maybe  _it's_  bigger on the inside," Rose suggests, rather waspishly. Shame washes over her when the Doctor frowns, looking a bit hurt, and she wraps her arms around her knees, curling herself into a little ball.

It was so much easier when she was seven.

_Are you angry with me?_

"I just don't see why you have to keep pushing," Rose sighs. "It was years ago."

_You mentioned it,_ says the Doctor, his usual bluntness offset by the soft stroke of his thumb along her knuckle.  _I thought you might want closure._

"Not this time," says Rose. "Sometimes humans just want to forget about things, Doctor, and this . . . 's not exactly my proudest moment."

_It's still you, Rose._ The roof is slanted low so he crawls to her side, slinging an arm around her.  _It still helped shape you into the person you are and I happen to love that person._ His lips brush softly against her own, offering reassurance that words alone can't bring.  _I will_ always _love that person._

**. . .**

_"Rose! Rose - hey, wait up!"_

_Clutching a cafeteria tray tightly in both hands - it's pizza day and her mum lent her the money - Rose heads quickly toward the corner table. She nearly drops her food when Kenny's hand brushes her elbow._

_"Didn't you hear me?"_

_Rose shakes her head, not looking at him. "No. Sorry."_

_"I haven't seen you all week. Mum says you've been going over somewhere else."_

_"Yeah. Shareen invited me over to her house," Rose explains. "And it's nearer my mum's, so we thought that was better."_

_"Oh." Kenny kicks at an imaginary pebble with his shoe. "Maybe next week, then? My dad just got me the new X-Men. It's really cool."_

_"I don't really like X-Men. Sorry." The words make Rose's stomach hurt to say them and, looking down at her slice of pizza, feels a bit nauseous. She wonders if Mrs. Cormier will give her a pass to the nurse but before she can ask, Kenny calls out for her again. He says something too fast for Rose to hear but then he kisses her, his lips wet and sloppy and gross, and things happen even faster._

_Rose shoves him away, face twisted in disgust, shouting that she_ got her cootie shot for a reason _, but the damage has been done. Everyone has seen and everyone is laughing - Suzanne and Marc and Louise Booger-Eater - and by the end of the day the whole school will be singing about Rose and Kenny kissing in a tree again so that even if cooties doesn't kill her, humiliation will. She wants to throw up now more than ever._

_Five minutes later that's exactly what she does while the headmistress calls her mum and the nurse strokes her hair._

**. . .**

_You know that was wrong of him,_ the Doctor reminds her, just as he does every time.  _You know that, Rose._

"He was seven, Doctor," Rose reminds him, just as she does every time. "He was a kid and he liked me and 's not like I told him what was going on. . . ."

_So he forced himself on you?_

"For two seconds." Still, his arm tightens protectively around her and Rose squirms a bit in his hold. "Trust me, Doctor, I'm not scarred for life or anything."

_But you're upset,_ says the Doctor knowingly.

Rose shakes her head, a vehement denial; the material of the Doctor's suit makes a funny noise when her hair swooshes against it. "Not 'cause of that. He apologized after, and all.  _I_ was the one who didn't accept it."

The Doctor snorts, tearing viciously into the box of cupcakes.  _For humiliating you like that? I should think not._

"He was still my friend, Doctor." Rose snags a cellophane-wrapped pastry from the Doctor's hands, not up to dealing with a tummy ache-afflicted Time Lord. "He was my best friend. And then we just -  _stopped_ being friends. And it was all my fault."

_You were seven._ The Doctor parrots Rose's own words back at her.

But Rose only shakes her head again. "Doesn't excuse it. 'S one thing to make a mistake but I knew exactly what I was doing. I wanted to be friends with the popular girls and he was just - standing in the way of that, so I just . . . god, Doctor, I told him I never wanted to talk to him again. I called him - ugh, I don't even remember  _what_ I called him, but it was this really nasty stuff."

_Stupidhead?_ the Doctor suggests, a well-intentioned attempt at humor, but Rose hardly hears him.

"He lent me these comics, too, and I never gave him them back. They're still at Mum's, or . . . what if I threw them out? What if they were collectors' items and I just threw them out 'cause I didn't want to look uncool or whatever? And he could've sold them . . . he could be rich right now if it wasn't for me - god, I'm such a bitch."

_Hey, hey._ The Doctor frames Rose's face with both hands and she feels her breathing begin to even out at the firm pressure of his fingers, tracing along her jawline.  _Don't call yourself that. Don't ever call yourself that. Do you understand?_

He waits for Rose's reluctant assent before continuing.

_We're here to put this behind us, yes? If you won't let me blame this Kenny for something that happened when he was seven and didn't know better, then I certainly won't let the love of my lives blame herself for something which is, in my rather brilliant opinion, a perfectly reasonable reaction to the first something._ He raises his eyebrows and, at the sight of her watery eyes, waggles them slightly to lighten the moment.

_You're a good person, Rose,_ he says seriously, nudging her nose with his.  _One little mistake won't change that._

Again, Rose nods. Nibbling nervously at her cuticle, she ventures, "We couldn't change it, could we? Go back and talk to me and him and fix things?"

_No,_ he says firmly, tone brooking no room for argument,  _your timeline is not one I'm willing to risk. There's too great a potential for paradoxes._

"Like if I ended up with him instead of you?" Rose asks archly.

The Doctor scoffs.  _It would hardly be a competition. I have a spaceship._

"He has a treehouse."

_Which the TARDIS could easily recreate,_ the Doctor points out, performing lower lip calisthenics that have the potential to become a serious pout.  _Probably a better one, too._  (For a man who has faced down dictators with a smile on his face, Rose muses, he is remarkably transparent when it comes to matters of the heart.)

"Yeah?" Rose runs a hand down the Doctor's chest, batting her eyelashes exaggeratedly up at him. "You wanna show me your treehouse, Doctor?"

_Oh, yes!_ Grinning devilishly back, the Doctor captures her lips in a searing kiss before bouncing away. Rose scrambles after him down the ladder and when they reach the ground again and he pulls her against him - ostensibly to keep her steady, but she can feel the real reason bulging against his tight blue trousers (not that she's complaining) - and is grateful they parked the TARDIS just down the street.

**. . .**

Much, much later when Rose is lying, sweaty and sated, on the polished mahogany floor of the studio-sized treehouse, while she stares up at the stars of some distant galaxy through a skylight which the TARDIS so helpfully provided and the Doctor presses idle, drowsky kisses to her breasts and neck, she swears she can hear him singing. He always gets a bit dopey after an orgasm and he doesn't seem preoccupied with proper pentameter or Time Lord protocol (which they must have smashed to bits by now) and Rose lets the words wash over her, stocking them away for the next time he teases her for drooling on the pillow.

_The Doctor and Rose, sitting in a tree, S-H-A-G-G-I-N-G._


	27. Love and Marriage

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Got some Nine/Rose & Ten/Rose in this one. :)

The Doctor doesn't mean to fall in love. Yes, she's beautiful but he's called well-oiled machines beautiful. Yes, she's brave and smart and quick on her feet, but so are all of his companions - the long-term ones, anyway. Yes, she makes a cup of tea like nobody's business but this is something she's learned from her mother who he isn't too fond of on the best of days.

Individually, none of these things equate to love. Friendship, certainly. Lust, maybe. Never love. Time Lords can't, Time Lords shouldn't, Time Lords aren't capable of such a thing (especially not Time Lords who slaughtered their own people). Taken together, it  _could_  be argued that he  _might_  have romantic intentions (if Time Lords did that sort of thing, which they didn't) but could just as easily be interpreted as best-friendship.

Worst of all are the little things; it is these that are his undoing. The way she twirls the ice cream spoon round her mouth, tongue questing for the last drops of Rocky Road, or the way she shrugs on a tatty old sweatshirt, hair all mussed and wiggling her fingers at him once she succeeds in wending them through the armholes.

 _Used to be Mickey's,_ she says when he mentions that it looks a bit big on her, and he tries not to scowl.

His frown only grows at the realization that he is trying not to appear jealous of an idiot whose only accomplishment thus far has been dating Rose Tyler. More than this, that it matters what she thinks of him, this nineteen-year-old shop girl who has become as much a part of his life as running for it.

Not that he would ever fault her for this; the blame rests solely with him for being too weak. (And if he gave in, what then? - his damaged soul would snuff out her light in a second.) Still, it's maddening, and some days he is quicker to snap at her for asking one too many questions or for wandering off in quest of some pretty trinket while he's busy haggling that inevitably leads to madness and mayhem. More often than not, he will pocket this shiny bit or bob after all the excitement is over, in hopes that he will work up the courage to present her with it later. Usually, he leaves it on her bureau or bedside table, somewhere it can be overlooked till she forgets where it came from in the first place. Can't have her thinking that he'll capitulate to her every request: he's her Time Lord, not her boyfriend.

It's a losing battle, but one he is determined to lose with grace. (Time Lords are never anything but.) There are, after all, much worse fates than getting to hear Rose Tyler's laugh every day. Love he can handle. Love is just a feeling and feelings can be controlled, kept under wraps. Feelings do not have to be acted on.

Then he has to go and buy the bloody ring.

He blames Jackie. More specifically, he blames Jackie's soaps which she ropes Rose - and, by extension, him - into watching whenever they venture a visit. Not only are the plots ridiculous, littered with red herring and  _deus ex machina_  but every time things get good (a subjective term), they're interrupted by a commercial break. Rose and Jackie chat while the Doctor lets the ads wash by, a haze of garish color and loud voiceovers, so that the low, romantic piano chords set against a monochromatic tableau are startling by contrast.

Without fail, Jackie's eyes will grow soft as the desperately-seeking-work actor slips the huge diamond ring onto the desperately-seeking-work actress's hand. Sometimes, Rose's will too. The Doctor's eyes will roll to the ceiling.

"It's all saccharine nonsense," he's always quick to inform Rose. "They're even worse in the future. Some of the higher-end shops even let you simulate it, work out any kinks."

_That's a bit dull._

"Glad to know I can cross that off my list, then." The words sound too loud in his own ears, too dry and affected for the sarcasm in them to be entirely credible. If Rose notices, she doesn't show it.

 _Scripting it an' all, though,_ she continues. _Isn't the whole point of a proposal the surprise? Being, like, spontaneous?_

"Everything has to be planned out to some degree, Rose."

 _So says you._ She laughs.

"It's true! I wouldn't jump off a cliff if I didn't know what was at the bottom."

_Yes, you would._

He nods and grunts, a grudging concession to her point. "All the same. That's about saving the world, no time to weigh the pros and cons. Marriage is different. Don't take the time to think and you can end up making the biggest mistake of your life." (There are sharp rocks at the bottom of that cliff.) "Why do you think divorce rates are so high?"

 _Have you ever been?_ asks Rose.  _Married,_ she adds at his confused expression.

"No," he answers, and it doesn't feel like a lie. Gallifreyan marriages were a separate entity entirely from her culture's concept of the word. It was a partnership but not a romantic one, only a means of sustaining their superior species.

It doesn't feel a thing like what he has with Rose.

Part of him wants to take the leap.

It is this part which hands over his credit stick to the eager, snatching shopkeeper for the modest-sized diamond - their lifestyle isn't conducive to large amounts of jangling jewelry, hoop earrings notwithstanding - studded with morganite, and a matching necklace.

It is the part afraid of falling that tucks both items deep into the pocket of his leather jacket.

Though, to be fair, Jack is the one to pinch the psychic paper which grants the three of them VIP admission to the hottest club within fifty miles and several centuries. Rose is the one to scurry away to the wardrobe and slip on the slinkiest dress she can find, such a dark shade of blue it's almost black and patterned with stars. The Doctor is the one to stare (unabashedly when Rose wasn't looking and cautious when she was), wondering if he maybe ought to kiss her before asking her to be his wife.

He settles for neither, keeping both tucked away under his layers of tight suit and innocent flirtation. This may be his tenth regeneration, but he feels younger than he has in years - a side effect, he assumes, of daily doses of Rose Tyler - his lack of control more controllable than his previous iteration's rigidity. Loving Rose Tyler is no longer a battle he allows himself to lose but a general he offers fealty to.

The proscriptions of protocol and custom that used to bind him so tightly growing looser, more fluid, with each passing day, he presents Rose with the necklace on Christmas night, takes her on dates (a term he doesn't shirk at using) to concerts and films and musicals, shares his bed and, at long last, his hearts with her. He becomes the man he never thought he'd want so much to be.

But he doesn't mean to propose.

At least he doesn't mean to propose like  _this_. He has plans, romantic plans - candlelit dinners and horse-drawn carriages on Paris IV or bubble baths and champagne in the comfort of the TARDIS - more plans than stars in the sky. Even if he could narrow it down to one, what is he supposed to say? What words can possibly encapsulate the depths of his love for this pink-and-yellow woman? The pockets of his overcoat are full of aborted attempts at romantic monologues; he'd considered commissioning Shakespeare or Marlowe to write one for him if that wouldn't take away the personal touch. Besides, he always ran the risk of Rose having read that same poem in secondary school and declining his mediocre proposal for sheer lack of effort.

Sure, she seemedhappy enough with him, and on most days he was 99.99% sure she would say yes. But then there came those afternoons when he said something tactless or condescending - something that proved he  _wasn't_  human, no matter how much he tried to be - and, while he shuffled sadly around the TARDIS, waiting for Rose to come home from Jackie's or Martha's or Donna's (none of whom would pick up when he called), that 0.01% taunted him.

_This your way of proposing, then?_

"Yes."

Instead, here they are. Standing in their jimjams in lieu of a tuxedo and evening gown or, better yet, nothing at all. Munching on shortbread instead of caviar (which Rose would turn up her nose at and ask for a fried version of the full-grown thing instead, chips on the side) or edible body chocolate. Discussing potential terms of endearment - a futile attempt at distracting himself from the fact that the only thing he really wants to call her is  _wife_ , an indisputable answer to inquisitive passersby and impudent would-be suitors - rather than her answer to his spontaneous proposal.

"You don't have to," he stammers after twenty-three seconds have passed. That she hasn't demanded to be taken back home (referring to the Powell Estates as  _home_ would be the final nail in the proverbial coffin) is a good thing; that she hasn't said anything in the intervening twenty-five seconds - not so much.

"That is - this isn't me . . . I'm perfectly happy with the way things are. But if you wanted to, not that I'm saying you want to, but if you  _wanted_ to - then, well, it's an option, isn't it? A good option. Great option, if you ask me. But - but! You weren't asking me. This is  _your_ decision, Rose. Only yours. Yours alone. Say  _no_ , say  _maybe_ , say - say. . . ."

The last syllable comes out muffled against Rose's lips but she takes the liberty of translating it anyway.

_Yes._

He means to construct a romantic monologue out of the fractured pieces in his suit jacket and overcoat (there are even a few in the pockets of this bathrobe) but the Doctor finds himself lost for words. For at least twenty-three more seconds all he can do is beam at Rose and all she can do is grin back at him, reaching down to interlock the fingers of her right hand with his left, stroking her thumb across his knuckles. Taking this as a cue to action, the Doctor's legs spasm convulsively for a second before his brain catches up and he sprints down the hall to the console room, fiancee in his wake.

His overcoat is hanging from one of the coral struts and he skids to a halt beside it, rifling through the pockets, barely registering the miscellany that clatters to the grating around him - steel washers and screws, a travel-sized jar of banana jam and tube upon tube of lip gloss and chapstick (none of them banana-flavored) - except to the extent that they are not a blue velvet box.

Continuing to delve frantically through his transdimensional pockets, empty and dangling now, the Doctor curses his stupidity. He should never have waited this long. He should have popped the question that first day or, failing that, any day thereafter. He'd taken her to Barcelona last week, had contracted a gondola ride for the express purpose of working up the nerve; he really thought he'd had it with the way she peeked up at him, smiling so tenderly and tugging his arms more firmly about her waist when he faltered for words and his mouth went dry. It was perfect.

Then again, what if he dropped the ring into the water? Even worse, what if Rose got seasick? True, the current was calm right now but the weather on Barcelona could be capricious around this time of year; if there was one thing that put a damper on romance, it was vomit. Worse still, what if she said no? Not only would the ride back to shore be excruciatingly awkward, it might be enough to break them. Best to keep it safe here in his pocket, a Gallifreyan Gollum.

Idly, the Doctor wonders if a hobbit could have broken into the TARDIS before dismissing the idea as insane. The planet of Tolkien is thousands of lightyears away. Out of an infinity of hems and haws,  _uh_ s and  _er_ s, Rose has said  _yes_. Things are perfect. He is the only one at fault, the Time Lord who can't find the ring he was too cowardly to give her ages ago that must be buried under two tonnes of old shoelaces and empty jam jars.

_Doctor?_

"Hang on, Rose," he calls, cheerfully as he can muster. Still, he can't help but cringe a bit as he hears her footsteps grow closer, anticipating a revokal of her acceptance. Instead, she taps him on the nose with a little velvet box, caught between her forefinger and thumb.

_This what you're looking for?_

"Where did you. . . ?" The answer springs to mind before he can complete the sentence: the  _click-clack_ open-and-shut of the ring box and the way the diamond sparkles in the light of the TARDIS coral (muted so it doesn't wake Rose), the cold metal grating under his slipper-socked feet as he paces, back-and-forth, back-and-forth, willing words that are stuck in his throat to come. Fruitless motivation sessions, all.

Leave it to Rose Tyler to find something he'd thought lost for good.

 _I didn't look,_ says Rose, and she wraps his suddenly clumsy fingers around the tiny box.  _Thought if you went to all this trouble, then you'd want to surprise me._

"Yes," he agrees, a bit hoarsely, and is glad he didn't try for a second syllable. Reverently he thumbs the box open with a tiny  _click_ , fumbling the diamond in his too-large hand. She's silent and he wonders if he should get down on one knee, starts to do so, jolts at Rose's touch to his forearm and nearly drops the ring again.

 _Doctor._ There's laughter in her voice but her eyes are gentle and coaxing. _I said yes already._

"Right," he croaks. "Right. Well, then you just need the - right. Yes." He takes her left hand in his own, slides the ring onto her third finger with his own clammy ones. It looks better than he ever could have imagined and he squeezes the tips of her fingers.

Rose squeezes back, wiggling her fingers in his grasp so she can extend them in front of her, turning them this way and that so the ring catches the light. Obligingly, the TARDIS brightens.

 _It matches my necklace,_ she says thoughtfully.  _Those pink gems._

"Morganite," the Doctor offers. And, throwing caution to the wind, "I bought them together."

After all, relationships weren't about secrets and marriages certainly weren't. Marriage was about laying it all on the table (figuratively and, on one particular planet, where he was strapped to an altar, naked save for a bright orange bowtie, and forced to recite both his vows and a commercial jingle for hair pomade, literally). It was about finding someone who would share in those secrets and add a few of her own to the pile. Someone who would tap his thumb with her forefinger when her mother (charming woman) was giving them a hard time over their next visit or staying for dinner or - ironically enough - marriage to ask if he was ready to go home or knew just the way to stroke his hair after some night terror from centuries gone by. Someone who maybe, just maybe, had been in love with him as long as he had been with her.

 _Oh._ Her voice comes out in a squeak, barely believing. Then, softer still,  _That long?_

"Longer." He takes her hand in his again, presses his against it so their splayed fingers overlap both his hearts. Their frantic pace has slowed but he can feel Rose's pulse, fluttering madly against his long digits. "I never was very good with timing," he adds, if only to coax a shaky laugh from her.

 _Then let's not waste any more of it, yeah?_ She squeezes his arm.  _How's Barcelona sound?_

Barcelona sounds wonderful. He's been the plus-one to enough of Rose's cousins' weddings to be well-versed in all the pomp and circumstance: the big white dress and the stiff black tux, conga lines and Rose's tipsy Aunt Bev who always gets a bit handsy, a bouquet and garter toss in which he has begun to suspect Jackie's involvement. What better way to avoid all this than a five-minute ceremony on some distant beach, light-years away from hot pink taffeta and place settings?

The only problem is that those don't seem like problems anymore. Inconvenient, yes. Annoying, certainly. But insurmountable? Not for the stuff of legend. He'll fold a thousand origami-swan napkins, pose for a million cheesy shots, if it means he can show the world Rose Tyler is his.

"You're sure?"

 _Yeah,_ she answers, slightly wary. Her brows draw together as his shoulders sag.  _That alright?_

"Yeah," he echoes her. "Yeah, 'course it is. Just - if you want to . . . could we make a couple stops first?"

 _Sure._ The collar of his buttondown slides down one shoulder as she shrugs and he gets a glimpse of his favorite freckle.  _Do you have a tux on rent somewhere?_

"Nah, TARDIS can provide that," he says, waving the question away and trying to remember where he had asked her to stash his ceremonial robes while debating the merits of pissing his ancestors off over the comfort of his pinstripes. "But I  _did_  promise Donna she could be my best man. Martha should come too, if you want a bridesmaid. I'm sure she and Mickey - or at least Martha, but fuchsia does make Mickey's eyes  _pop_. Oh! And Jackie!" He surprises himself at this uncharacteristic display of enthusiasm - Rose as well if her twitching lips are any indication - and, not about to be held responsible for biweekly teas with Jackie, Pete, and Gran Prentiss, hastens to explain himself. "She'll kill me if she misses it and I don't much fancy a regeneration as a wedding present. Rather fond of this body."

Rose's fingers trail down his chest, a display of faux-nonchalance that sets his skin prickling. The hairs on his arms standing straight up, he snatches up her errant hand in his larger one.

"Save that for the honeymoon, Mrs. Tyler," he admonishes with a wink that rather ruins the effect. "Sorry," he wrinkles his nose, "that makes it sound like I'm marrying your mother, doesn't it?"

 _No, 's alright._ Her thumb strokes softly along his knuckles.  _I like it._

He beams at her; he can't seem to stop doing that. "Better than pookie-bear?"

_Much better._

"Fantastic." It's the first word that springs to mind, his last body's equivalent to  _I love you_ , but those few syllables still aren't enough to encompass the incredible reality of the situation. He doesn't think there's a word in the universe that could; even  _supercalifragilisticexpialidocious_ doesn't come close.

Allowing himself a few more seconds of blissful gazing, the Doctor snaps to attention. There's work to be done.

"Right, Rose Tyler. I'll pick up our guests and you," he leans forward so their foreheads touch and he nuzzles her nose, "go find something to wear. Bad luck to see my bride on her wedding day, isn't it?"

Rose brushes her lips briefly over his.  _Think we've had our fair share of bad luck already, Doctor. The universe owes us a bit, I reckon._

"Oh, I dunno," he disagrees, waggling his eyebrows, "I feel rather  _lucky_." But Rose ducks under his arms when he moves in for a deeper kiss.

_Save it for the honeymoon, Mr. Tyler._

Oh, he likes the sound of that. He likes the sound of that very much -  _the Doctor and Mrs. Tyler_  - claiming him with her name just as he long ago made her his plus-one. So caught up in the idea (and wondering if Rose will settle on the dress she wore for that underwater ceremony six months back which the TARDIS, wonderful ship that she was, stocked away somewhere in the annals) he only offers up a token protest to Rose's increasing impromptu guestlist, Sylvia Noble and Francine Jones among them. Apparently, they and Jackie have become fast friends - no surprises there.

But when he marries her underneath the orange sky, hem of his robes brushing the sand that slips between his toes, none of it matters. Not his mother-in-law sniffling and blowing her nose loudly every forty-two seconds, Sylvia and Francine patting her on the back. Not Mickey who stares, gape-mouthed, at his flowing crimson-and-gold robes (and makes the Doctor glad to have forgone the headpiece) till Martha's glare and Donna's smack turn his eyes to the bride. Not even Jack who smirks at some of the dirtier-looking Gallifreyan words (transcribed and authored by the Doctor because who is there to say  _Time Lords shouldn't_ except the last remaining Time Lord?) so that he is forced to interject  _really, that doesn't mean what you think it means_.

For better or for worse, here is the life he has made. Here are the people he loves (or can at least endure), who have made his life all the richer for their significance in this vast universe. Here is the woman he loves, catching her pinkie finger in one of the looped strips of silk and stifling a giggle when he frees it, guiding her hands to form the knot between them, silent tears slipping down her face as she binds herself to him, first in his language and then her own, for their guests' sake. He whispers the translation to her anyway as her tongue stumbles over the ungainly syllables, encouraging her to form the words that he has crumpled and discarded a million times, word that form the pieces of his heart.

_I will love you, honor you, cherish you always._

_I will be your partner in all things, the keeper of your hearts._

_I am yours and you are mine: for as long as we both shall live._

Here is his wife and he knows this, if nothing else, is what he was meant to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone wondering, the proposal bit is meant to take place during Chapter 24 (Pet Names). I know that chapter was a bit confusing, so I thought I'd clarify.


	28. A Baby Carriage

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since I don't want to mislead any of you, let's get one thing clear. This is not babyfic. I love reading and, in some cases, writing babyfic, but this chapter is a (slightly angsty) exploration of a way things could have gone. 
> 
> From Jackie's POV since I love writing Jackie.

Jackie Tyler will be the second person to admit that she can be a bit overbearing. ( _A bit much,_ as her new Pete diplomatically refers to it and makes her wonder what her parallel self was like.) The first, of course, is her son-in-law who, five years later, is still prone to brushing off her concerned inquiries with an _it’s-too-complicated / you-wouldn’t-understand / how-about-some-tea_ and squirming away from her welcoming kisses, more a toddler than the actual toddler who the Doctor will invariably sweep up in his arms, digging into one of his Mary Poppins-ish pockets for another toy hovercar or action figure. At which point Jackie will remind him that he’s lucky she didn’t give him more than a slap for abducting her daughter and dropping her off twelve months past curfew and if that’s overbearing so sue her.

“What?” asks Pete, who hasn’t heard this story before. He looks from Rose to Jackie and, finally, to the Doctor who clutches Tony to his chest, a genetic shield, till Rose rescues her brother from his grasp. Unperturbed, Tony continues whooshing his miniature TARDIS around their heads, complete with aeroplane noises, and narrowly avoiding a collision with one of Rose’s hoop earrings.

An overbearing mother, Jackie thinks but doesn’t say, would also not rescue her overly candid son-in-law from an interrogation by Pete Tyler in full-on protective father mode with a casual _all worked out for the best_ and a reminder that there’s a Sunday roast waiting to be carved.

The Doctor offers her a grateful half-smile and Jackie hands him a stack of plates and cutlery to set the table with. Martha and Mickey and Donna and Shaun will be showing up any minute, cheesecake and puddings in tow; not to be outdone, the Doctor has made his own special blue banana-cream pie. Martha’s eating for three these days and her sweet tooth is insatiable.

It’s something she insists on, these weekly dinners. The others can’t always make it but a time machine, while it does allow them to spend more than a week between visits, also ensures that Rose and the Doctor are knocking on the door by eleven AM sharp. (The Doctor tried to explain paradoxes once but Jackie’s eyes glazed over two minutes in.) They helped give her this life, a life she thought died with her first Pete, and she refuses to let them hover at the edges, casual visitors who stop by to do laundry and catch up on telly.

So they come for Sunday dinners and cheer at Tony’s peewee football matches; they babysit on the weekends when Jackie needs a break and, once in a blue moon, will leave Tony with his Aunt Martha or Donna to go on a double-date with the in-laws. Unfortunately, leaving the three-year-old behind doesn’t necessitate an end to immaturity; they’ve been (politely) kicked out of more than one establishment because the Doctor insisted on interrogating the chef on the familial attachments of the lobsters (that night’s special) or scanning their waitress with his bloody screwdriver before he would allow her to pour Rose a glass of water.

At the end of the night, Rose will peck her on the cheek and the Doctor will envelop her in a brief but tight hug and the two of them will walk back to the TARDIS hand-in-hand; it is a sight that buoys Jackie when she is tucked up in bed next to Pete. It is indisputable proof that their life is no different than any other couple’s. Maybe a bit stranger, but strange she can accept. Dead in the year 4092, she can’t. The Doctor always promised her he would bring Rose back home but she wonders sometimes if he would even have the will to, wouldn’t just sink down beside her and wait for his hearts to stop for good. Rose has always been the stronger one, whether it’s tussling with Mickey at five or telling the Doctor what’s what at twenty-five when all he wants her to do is _stay here, I’ll take care of this one_. She’s inherited Jackie’s stubbornness though the Doctor would probably call it _bullheadedness_ (mumbled in an affectionate undertone), and, when all she is looking for is gossip over crap telly and a cup of tea without threat of an alien invasion, Jackie is inclined to agree.

It is, after all, why she hasn’t raised the Baby Issue.

At least not more than twice.

“It’s just not in the cards for us, Mum,” Rose said the first time she’d mentioned it. (Or at least mentioned that Tony was growing so fast and she had a drawerful of baby clothes that it would be a shame to give away but, along with her stubbornness, Rose had inherited the innate ability to cut straight through the bullshit.) “Kids. Aliens. Saving the universe. One of these things is not like the other.”

“Martha’s expecting,” offered the Doctor before Jackie could pursue the point further. Jam jar in one hand and Jackie-ordained spoon in the other, he flopped down on the couch next to Rose, scooting up beside her and resting his head on her shoulder like an overgrown puppy.

“How do you know that?” asked Jackie. She turned to Rose whose expression hovered somewhere between friendly interest and mild surprise. “You didn’t tell me that.”

“Smelled her.” The Doctor tapped the tip of his nose with one sticky finger. “Twins, I think. Don’t even think they know ye- oh! But pretend you don’t know when they tell you,” he added, looking proud of himself for correctly interpreting Rose’s chastising poke. Exchanging the half-empty jar for a tabloid magazine, he scoffed at the headlines but flipped through it anyway, babbling on about the contestants on some futuristic reality show and bantering with Rose over who should be voted off next week.

If he had read any further into their conversation beyond Jackie’s innocent inquiry, he didn’t let on. For a bloke who had been around the block a few times, Jackie thought, he could be remarkably thick. Still, she waited several weeks to broach the subject again, once the Doctor had persuaded Tony into a raincoat and galoshes - after a fortnight of rain, she insisted on them but Tony would put up a fuss over the garments unless it was his big brother-in-law who put them on, going on about planets where the height of fashion was neon rubber boots and raincoats - and taken him to the park across the street.

“Can you, though?” she asked, too busy scolding herself for any unintentional callousness to bother with context.

“Hmm?” Over the boiling of the kettle, Rose didn’t appear to have heard. Or, after years of contending with the Doctor’s non sequiturs, she assumed that clarification must be forthcoming. Jackie was quick to offer it, gentling her tone.

“Can you have kids, sweetheart? Because, you know, there’s always adoption. . . .”

Rose’s teaspoon clinked unnaturally loud against the rim of her teacup as she stirred in the sugar and milk. When she spoke, it was with a petulant groan bordering the edges, “Mum. . . .”

“And I know the Doctor would love any child you two had together, biological or not. Just look how he is with your brother.”

“Mum just drop it, alright?” Rose grabbed the package of chocolate biscuits from their spot on top of the fridge, out of Tony’s sticky-fingered reach. “Me and the Doctor, we’re fine.”

“You can’t blame me for being curious, love. The two of you’ve been together for - what, six years now?” She waved off her daughter’s usual protest that it _wasn’t all that_ \- love was love and that slap hadn’t just been for his _minor miscalculation_ in curfew. “You must’ve discussed it at some point.”

“We _have_ discussed it.” Rose’s sharp tone was echoed in the crack of the biscuit as she bit into it. Crumbs spilled from her lips to swirl in the still-steeping mug of tea and she stared down at them, wrapping her fingers around the warm mug. “There’s enough people needing saving without someone else to worry about.”

“Is that what you think or what he thinks?” The sound of children's laughter (if you could characterize a thousand-year-old man as a child) drifted through the half-open window; the Doctor was pushing Tony on the swingset, getting both of them splattered with mud on every downswing. Eyes fixed on the same sight, Rose didn’t answer at first.

“What we both think.”

“Sweetheart, you know that man would do anything for you. . . .”

“That doesn’t mean I’m gonna _make_ him do it, Mum. I mean, god, he’s - _we’re_ not even totally sure if - we’d just be getting our hopes up. And even if we _could_ , if _I_  could, ‘s not like. . . .” Too soon, Rose went for her mug of tea, lips pursing as she forced herself to swallow the hot liquid.

“Like what?”

When Rose’s reply came it was slow and halting, as though the words were being dragged from her. “He’s already lost one family, Mum. And they were Gallifreyan, too. Like him. Me,” she laughed hollowly, “I’m just human.”

“You aren’t _just_ anything, Rose,” Jackie reproved because the Doctor wasn’t around to.

“I’ll wither and die,” Rose spoke over her, caught up in her own self-recriminating justification. “Our kids, too. They’d all - they’d be like _me_. I can’t do that to him, Mum. He doesn’t deserve that.” Setting the mug back on the counter with trembling hands, she wrapped her arms around herself, rubbing at upper arms that were goosepimpled despite the warm breeze wafting in through the kitchen window.

“I’m not that selfish,” she whispered to the tile, as if in affirmation.

“Of course you’re not, love,” said Jackie. Again, because the Doctor wasn’t around to. He had mentioned a mental connection a few times in passing - quickly followed by a request for tea - and marveled that it would malfunction now of all times; if Rose was in any amount of distress, he was sure to be glued to her side. Her unspoken rebukes soon found a verbal avenue as the Doctor burst into the flat, a whimpering Tony in his arms and a flurry of _sorry, so sorry_ s on his lips. Snatching Tony from his tight grip, a snarl on her own, Jackie cut through his babbling, demanding to know what had happened.

_Why weren’t you watching him better?_

_How could you have let him slip?_

_Where the hell do you think you’re going? Think your alien gadgets are better than some old-fashioned Bacitracin, do you?_

“It’s just the dermal regenerator, Mum,” sighed Rose, but she looked relieved at the change in topic. In a few strides she’d taken the Doctor’s hand in hers and was whisking him out of the flat, much to Jackie’s consternation. They wouldn’t disappear on her again, not when so many more questions and recriminations sat waiting on the tip of her tongue - chief among them how the man who professed to love her daughter more than anything in the universe could make that daughter feel so fundamentally worthless, for no reason other than not having his superior strands of DNA or however the hell Time Lord biology worked.

Yes, it hurt to know that she would likely have to wait another twenty-five years for the possibility of biological grandchildren. It was a blow to have the images of a little girl with rumpled brown hair like her father or a little boy with soft brown eyes like his mother, abruptly shattered. (Not to discount Mickey and Martha’s brood, but Francine would be the one to hold the coveted title of _Gran_.) Gut-wrenching as it was to admit, it was their decision to make and, at the end of the day, not one she would judge them for making.

People compared the loss of a loved one to a hole in your heart but that _time healed all wounds_. A platitude that slipped off the tongue but meant so little in the face of it. The loss of a child was closer to having your heart torn out of your chest but you could still go on breathing even as your life-blood soaked into the ground in front of you. It was not a pain Jackie would wish on anyone, not even the man who had (inadvertently) led her to believe her own child was dead for a year. That year was worse than after the death of her first Pete; then, at least, she had had Rose, whimpering from her crib for a bottle or a nappy change or even just a cuddle in which Jackie was only too happy to oblige her if only to have someone to hold, someone who needed her. After Rose’s _death_ \- after the DIs and the dead-end case and the memorial service Shareen and Keisha had thrown together - she’d had no one; would, in fact, drift off to sleep, fabricating fantasies where Rose would come home in five, ten, fifteen minutes time, a morbid version of counting sheep. In the morning, it wasn’t the blare of the alarm or the hiss of the kettle she would awake to but the deafening sound of silence.

Incomprehensible was how he could possibly let Rose blame herself. Why he hadn’t supplanted that seed of doubt the instant it took hold in Rose’s mind with soft caresses and gentle reassurances. (He’d spotted the flicker of disappointment in her eyes the day their favorite chip shop was closed for renovations and popped into the TARDIS to return a half-hour later with a greasy container of vinegar-soaked chips.) How he could let her think that it was her humanity that was the problem when, Jackie saw in every action, this was the very thing he loved about her. The very thing he wanted.

But by the time she’d settled Tony down - all smiles again with a few of the verboten chocolate biscuits in one hand and a ten-tentacled alien plushie in the other - the errant duo had reappeared, regenerator and futuristic antibiotics in tow which the Doctor applied with the utmost care to Tony’s scraped-up face and hands. It wasn’t till he had smoothed a Disney bandaid (from Jackie’s self-lauded, human medicine cabinet) across the bridge of Tony’s nose that he straightened, looking her square in the face.

“I’m sorry, Jackie.”

“Oh, don’t apologize, love.” He looked so desolate that Jackie couldn’t bring herself to interrogate him further. When she stood on tiptoe to hug him the blades of his shoulders grew tense under her splayed fingers.

“I’m sorry,” he said again, too softly for anyone but Jackie to hear. Whether it was their mental connection or a heart-to-heart back at the TARDIS (they’d certainly been gone long enough), Jackie knew that he knew that she knew. What was more, he was absolutely terrified. Of her disapproval, of his future with Rose, of the Curse of the Time Lords (which, Rose, Martha, and Donna informed her, over drinks, drove most of his _bloody stupid angst-ridden decisions_ ) and what would come with giving in to it in comparison to not - who knew, but whatever it was left him frozen in her arms, muscles drawn taut by his crucifix of guilt and grief, one he will only let Rose bear a fraction of for fear of causing her still more pain, more ammunition to add to his self-made list of recriminations.

At a loss for words, all she could do was hold him tighter. The wrong move, as he stuttered out several more apologies, interspersing a half-dozen random so’s in between for good measure. Maybe he believed this to be his punishment - compulsory contact with his mother-in-law, a tight squeeze that he would have to inch his way out of before being squeezed out of the Tyler clan’s life forever. He couldn’t think her that vengeful, could he? That petty?

Over the Doctor’s shoulder, Rose watched them like a hawk, brown eyes narrowed and Jackie tried not to be wounded by this assumption.

“Accidents happen,” she reminded him, steadily as she could, and the Doctor nodded briskly to the top of her head, extricating himself from her loosened hold.

“How about some tea, Mum?” Rose suggested, taking on the role of stilted-silence breaker in lieu of the Doctor. “You wanna share some of those biscuits, Tony?”

As luck would have it, by the time only the dregs and crumbs remained of their snack, a telltale tread sounded in the hallway and Tony ran to the door to be swept up into the arms of his father. His Aunt Martha and Uncle Mickey followed close behind, both beaming fit to burst. Jackie had a shrewd suspicion what that was about but Martha’s excited squeal of “We’re having a baby!” was still more than enough to induce her own fit of surprised squeals.

“Twins!” Mickey added, chest puffed out with pride and, looking vindicated, the Doctor offered him a handshake before enveloping Martha in his trademark swing-around-and-squeeze embrace that he usually reserved for Rose. Though from the sparkle in her daughter’s eyes, Jackie didn’t think she minded one bit.

It’s the same look she spots when, after her and Pete’s own solo-date night - Rose and the Doctor having begged off, at the latter’s urging, to babysit Tony instead - and spots the trio nestled on the couch. Tony is in the middle, body contorted in a way that would be uncomfortable for any being other than a cat or a toddler. There’s a Star Trek rerun playing on the telly, muted for the dead-to-the-world Tony and the dozing Doctor whose head is leant on Rose’s shoulder, eyelids fluttering. Rose wiggles the fingers of her free hand at them in greeting and nudges her husband awake, just enough to slide her arm from under his sleep-laden head. It drops back down almost immediately and Jackie’s lips twitch.

“He hasn’t slept in a week,” says Rose, casting her husband a fond glance as she scoops Tony up from the sofa; he burrows his face into her shoulder and she presses a kiss to his blonde curls, still damp from a bath.

“I didn’t know he needed to sleep at all.” Having been woken too many times to the Doctor dissecting the television or alarm clock at three in the morning, Pete peers down at his son-in-law. “Alien and all - thought it was a choice with him.”

“He’s near enough to human,” says Jackie as Rose strides off down the hall, her brother in tow. “You should see him when he gets a cold. Like the world’s ending, it is.”

The Doctor snorts, his ego unassailable even in unconsciousness.

Reentering the room, Rose sets about the task of waking the Doctor, stroking his arm and murmuring into his ear. “He’s just been a bit stressed lately,” she throws over her shoulder, an off-of-the-cuff comment that sets Pete’s hackles up nevertheless.

“Trouble?” he asks.

“No,” Rose shrugs, “just science stuff.” She whispers again into the Doctor’s ears words that Jackie can’t hear and the Doctor stirs slightly. He doesn’t jerk awake anymore, like on that first Christmas spent together (the first time Jackie saw him sleep) or even in the first few months after when he still liked to pretend they weren’t anything more than friends, when he would fall asleep on the sofa before _heading back to the TARDIS, Jackie - Rose, I’ll see you in the morning_ which she would wake him from with a hand on the shoulder only to have him leap up from his spot and glare at her accusingly. Now, he swims slowly up from sleep, mouth stretching wide in a yawn, droopy eyes crinkling in a smile all their own as he catches sight of Rose.

“Hello.”

“Hello.” She smiles before mirroring his own yawn.

Every day so much less alien, so much more human. What does an extra heart, even a few extra faces, matter when he flips through a baby name book from Cygnus Prime once the dishes are cleared away in lieu of the gossip magazine, regaling Mickey and Martha with names like Horoflabar or Quazsli that expectant parents and concerned relatives alike are quick to shoot down.

“It’s unique!” argues the Doctor. “Think about picking them up from school. It wouldn’t be _Ben H._ or _Jacob S._ It’d be,” he turns a page, “here G’huflorg! No initial necessary!”

“If you could pronounce it,” says Jackie.

“Or the other kids hadn’t beaten the snot out of him already,” Donna adds.

“How about Hermione?” Rose suggests. Pulling her own face at the Doctor’s exaggerated pout, she tugs at his lower lip with her forefinger and thumb till he summons a halfway-reluctant smile.

Martha and Mickey exchange besotted smiles. “Possibly,” says Martha.

“You know, I still like G’huflorg,” teases Shaun. “What does it mean, Doctor? Brave one?”

“Oi! Don’t encourage him!” Donna buries her face in her hands before using her left to backhand her fiance’s close-cropped head of hair.

“Brave _and_ intelligent, actually. Much like his godfather.” The Doctor preens, fussing with his tie and gelled-to-within-an-inch-of-its-life hair.

Rose snorts over her sip of tea. “And humble, I take it.”

“Humble? No,” the Doctor dons his specs, lips and left eyebrow quirking upward in tandem, “no, I don’t think so. But I’m telling you, when little Hermione and G’huflorg are ruling the world. . . .”

“Hey, don’t drag me into this,” Rose pokes him in the side. “Harry Potter’s the furthest I’m willing to go.”

Mickey laughs. “Guess that puts the kaput on any _Doctor Juniors_ eh, boss?”

Infinitesimal enough not to be noticed, there is a few seconds’ pause where the Doctor goes just a shade paler than normal - not white as a sheet but the equivalent of a column over in Tony’s Crayola box - enough so his smattering of freckles is more obvious to the casual observer. Two seconds more where Rose devises a quick-witted retort of _Not a chance_ with her trademark tongue-touched smile and plucks the baby name book from the Doctor’s loose grip, placing it under a mug of green tea and a stack of coasters embossed with pictures from their post-wedding engagement photoshoot. It’s not like it was her fault the Doctor had waited six years to propose, nor that they had forgone the traditional route of place settings and stretch limousines, a lavish affair Jackie would have given her left arm for at Rose’s age. Tropical planet or not, the most Jackie had been able to capture of it were a few-dozen snaps from her and Sylvia’s digitals and the second they set back down on Earth, she’d insisted on scheduling an appointment with London’s most esteemed photo and videographer. Too busy introducing Rose as _my wife_ to every other person they passed on the street, the Doctor acquiesced with barely a syllable of protest, wrapping his arms around Rose and beaming at the flashing camera bulb.

Almost the same as the smile he offers up to them now, all excited dimples and eye crinkles, were it not for the few drops of damp darkness edging the irises and that Jackie pretends not to notice in deference to his unspoken request of toothy smiles and teasing. Recitations of polysyllabic baby names with too few consonants and too many vowels (or the other way round), hyperactive appeals to each member of the group in turn, sweeping a nap-groggy Tony up into his arms to corroborate his opinion, it is almost _too much_ Doctor to be entirely believable till Rose - hand grasped loosely in his like it always is - strokes her thumb in soft, soothing strokes along his knuckles, up his forearm, to the crook of his elbow, leaving tiny creases in the pinstripes and granting him leave to be a little bit less of himself again. (When it comes to the Doctor you don’t want too much _less_ , or he isn’t the Doctor anymore.)

With an announcement of _be right back_ and a smile slightly less maniacal, he rushes out of the flat to where the TARDIS is parked across the street (Jackie insisted on keeping the flat even after Torchwood got off the ground, but it gets crowded with nine people and a spaceship), reappearing several minutes later, long fingers wrapped around the push-handle of a pram that hovers several inches above the floor.

“Doctor,” Martha gasps, “Doctor, you really didn’t. . . .” Still, she runs a hand along the shimmery gold fabric that forms the canopy of the carriage, sliding the silky material between her fingers.

“So you don’t have to worry about uneven terrain!” The Doctor releases the handle to gesture excitedly; it remains stationary even after he lets go, emitting a soft humming sound similar to that of his spaceship. “You could be at the park or climbing Kilimanjaro, this beauty wouldn’t know the difference. Little Hermione and G’hu . . . er,” he falters at a warning look from Rose before carrying on with his spiel, “your children, the naming of whom is entirely up to yourself and Mickey here - well, they couldn’t be safer! Not as safe as they are at the moment, granted, all tucked up in their nice little amniotic sac but once they’re out in the big, wide world and not in the arms of a parent or grandparent or godparent or aunt or uncle or friend of the family who has been thoroughly vetted. . . .”

“I’m sure they love it, Doctor,” Rose assures him. Exaggeratedly, she mouths the word _ego_  at Martha and mimes stroking a cat. Across the room, Donna snorts into her tea.

“It’s gorgeous,” Martha affirms, still looking awestruck. “But you two, you’ve already - the baby shower alone. . . .”

She attempts to exchange another perceptive glance with Mickey. Implored by Rose and Jackie to plan a _boy’s day out_ (he scoffed at the title) with the Doctor who, thwarted in his attempts to wangle an invitation to the shower where he could offer his professional opinion on the best flavors of Gerber’s and booties alike to a captive audience, was sulking and sighing at every opportunity. This lackluster invitation the Doctor took as reason to draft Mickey into a trip to Mothercare where he cleaned the racks of the best baby gear that money (and psychic paper) could buy. Stunned speechless, neither Martha nor Rose had been able to say a word as, first their respective dolts, and then the Doctor alone (Mickey having given up after the third trip) lugged carrier bag after carrier bag from the TARDIS into Francine’s cozy brownstone, leaving Jackie to wonder just how much _bigger on the inside_ it was. Forming a united front, Donna and Jackie were the ones to insist _n_ _o human woman needs ten breast pumps, Spaceman_ and demand _what were you thinking, you plum_.

(If only for appearance’s sake, but Jackie still felt bad about it. That same manic look in his eyes then as just a few minutes ago, he explained - in disjointed bursts and gasps between unloading bags and scanning instruction manuals before tossing them in with the detritus of pastel-colored wrapping paper and ribbons - how you couldn’t trust the salespeople, the most expensive model wasn’t necessarily the best (so of course it made sense to buy them all instead) and _ooh_ , were they playing party games because his taste buds were second-to-none, _isn’t that right, Rose Tyler?_ till Rose could corner him in the kitchen, Jackie hot on her heels, sticking his pointer finger into a bowl of mysterious yellow mush only to recoil at the taste of _pear - oh, am I going to be having a word with_ you _, Francine Jones, if you think this is suitable sustenance for infants_.

This is around where Rose takes his hand, leading him through the trash-strewn sitting room and out onto the pavement, down the street. Wishing she could do more to help, Jackie helps to gather up the gifts that will go back to Martha and Mickey’s flat and the ones that will be given to Goodwill which, when the Doctor and Rose return some twenty minutes later, he agrees to with a tiny, sheepish smile.

“I have a few friends over at Royal Hope, too,” Martha adds. “They help teenage mothers and, you know, they can’t usually afford stuff like this. It’d be a godsend for them.”

“It _was_ sweet, Doctor,” Jackie says some hours later. It’s the only assurance she can offer, he won’t accept anything more so she has to settle for less. He doesn’t wrinkle his nose at the endearment as he usually does when uttered by anyone besides Rose, particularly overbearing mother-in-laws, but quirks his lips up in a tiny, half-smile and wraps her in one of his rare, one-armed hugs.)

Enraptured by the underside of the pram where, under the yellow ruffles, a few unobtrusive buttons and switches are tucked, Mickey doesn’t notice Martha's implicit SOS. Twirling a dial, he jerks back as four large rubber wheels, disproportionate to the dainty carriage, pop out from the bottom.

“There you go, Mister Mickey, jumping the gun again,” the Doctor sighs in accustomed exasperation. “I was _going_ to show you. If you do that and then flip this one and then turn _this_ one here just a little bit - see, a _little_ bit, Mickey - it turns into a car!”

Indeed, in front of them now is a sporty red-and-gold convertible, built to seat two tiny drivers. The Doctor presses a button on the dashboard and this, too, levitates a few inches off the carpet.

“Damn, Doctor,” Mickey whistles under his breath, “where were you when I was a kid?”

“Oh, here and there,” he quirks an enigmatic eyebrow, shrugs a nonchalant shoulder, “delivering red bicycles, you know.” He winks at Rose, gaze tactfully averted from Mickey’s incredulity and Jackie’s wobbly lower lip at the memory of her daughter’s gap-tooth smile after finding the bike ( _the same as the one in the window, Mum, ‘member, the one I showed you?_ ) parked outside their front door complete with a bell and pink ribbon where the name _Rose Tyler_ is scrawled. It’s the same scrawl she sees, but doesn’t recognize, some ten years later, this time left on a note on her coffee table letting Rose know he’s in the TARDIS and she’s welcome to come join him when she’s in the mood for a real adventure in lieu of the kind found on the afternoon soaps.

“Anyway, I’m all for camaraderie, but just . . . just don’t let them share it with the neighbors too much, alright? Awkward questions and it’s a rather, erm. . . .” Long fingers clutch at the air, coming up with nothing.

“Limited edition,” Rose supplies at the same time he blurts, “Itwasmine.” The words come out all in a rush, without pauses or separate syllables, and the Doctor clears his throat before repeating, with forced casualness, “It was mine.”

“Yours?” asks Martha.

“Mine,” he agrees. “‘Course, I made some minor alterations and adjustments. Just a few modifications, you know. Make it more user-friendly so you don’t need to worry about communicating telepathically.”

“With a _pram_?” Donna’s eyes dart between the Doctor and the carriage, disbelieving. “How barmy are you?”

“Well, it’s a lot quicker if you know what you’re doing,” says the Doctor, jumping to his own defense. “Most humans don’t. These switches and dials are just the manual way of doing things. A bit slower, but. . . .”

“Don’t be rude,” Rose reminds him.

“. . . nothing better, I say!” he amends. “And my lot weren’t really the race-car type. Or the anything-humans-would-consider-fun type. So now it’s a car, too!” Jackie has watched him enough episodes of Top Gear, shouting instructions to the drivers (most of which go unheeded), to know that a dislike of fast cars and bad driving is a black mark in the Doctor’s book.

“But those two,” he nods again toward Martha’s womb, “those two are gonna _love_ it.”

The smile that lights up his face this time holds no trace of shadow.

It will be a month before Martha lies in the hospital bed, exhausted but luminescent, little Adeola in her arms and even littler Rickey in Mickey’s, and the Doctor drops the bouquet of flowers Jackie has pressed into his arms while Rose lets the pink and blue balloons float up to bob among the fluorescent lights. All is abandoned in favor of studying the perfectly infinitesimal fingers and noses and toes of their _magnificent godchildren (never mind that you have Mickey for a dad)_.

It will be six months before he stands before the pulpit at St. Paul’s Church, fingers entwined with Rose’s before they release each other to take a baby each, vowing to care for them and guide them in the ways of Christ (or whatever beneficent higher power they might happen to believe in, the exasperated priest had specified after a two-hour consultation during which the male half of the potential godparents engaged him in a two-hour debate on the nature of religion), to renounce Satan and all his ways.

“Been there, done that,” says the Doctor and the priest’s lips part in question only to close again a second later.

It will be a year before Sunday dinner as usual where the Doctor and Rose arrive as usual with a young blonde woman in tow who calls them _Mum_ and _Dad_ and they call Jenny. Never mind that she looks a decade younger than Rose at the most, Jackie takes it in stride and introduces herself as _Gran_.

But a year-to-the-date before, on another Sunday dinner, he already has all he needs to stay anchored.


	29. Jenny

Rose gave up for good on human standards of normalcy in  a conference room on 10 Downing Street. If the Oxford definition of _normal_ didn’t include a picture of a time-traveling alien with ears too large for his head, then that word was something she would have to redefine for herself. And has, numerous times as the years went by.

Jenny’s return, then, does not foist a stilted normalcy upon them so much as offer an extension of the always-malleable definition to encompass her as well. It wasn’t precisely the way Rose pictured her initiation into motherhood. In the few teenage fantasies where her Mr. Right bore a shocking resemblance to Jimmy Stone and their cherubic blonde offspring none whatsoever to her terrors of cousins, her baby was just that - a baby. She imagined twenty years would pass, rather than three, before the words that followed _Mum_ were _can I borrow this top_ rather than _can I have another cookie_.

Even if Rose isn’t, technically, her mum; they had only taken the Doctor’s blood while Rose was forced to hang back with Donna and Martha till Jenny sprung from the capsule, fully-formed and complete, they later learned, with two hearts. Every inch her father’s daughter.

Yet he was still the one to ask if _she_ was alright. The covers were twisted around his long legs, his bare chest sheened in cold sweat. When Rose laid a hand to his chest, she could feel his two hearts, _thump-thump_ ing a tattoo against her palm as though trying to make up for a lifetime of missing beats, a life barely started. She didn’t have to ask what his nightmare had been about just like he didn’t have to ask why she was still lying, wide-awake, at 1:43 in the morning, TARDIS-time.

He did anyway, because comforting her was the best way to comfort himself.

_She was as much yours as mine._

“I hardly knew her.” He couldn’t argue this, she thought. Both she and Martha had been snatched by the Hath in the initial skirmish and spent most of the action separated from the rest of Team TARDIS. Rose and Jenny barely had time for a celebratory you’re-not-dead hug before General Cobb’s pistol rang out for the last time.

_She called you Mum,_ he said.

“Only ‘cause she saw me first. Like with baby animals, yeah? They just imprint on the first person they see and call them _Mum_. We both have the blonde hair, so I guess - but mine’s a dye job, anyway. Donna spent more time with her than I did. . . .”

The Doctor cut through her babbling with another soft _she called you Mum_. He pulled her tighter to him, kissing the top of her head. _She believed it even if you didn’t._

And, with another kiss, _So did I._

Rose bobbed her head against his breastbone in silent agreement, or the closest she could come to it. His skin was no longer so cold and clammy against her cheek, the frantic pace of his hearts had slowed, but he still held her so tightly, fingers gripping her waist almost but not hard enough to bruise. Unflinching, she trailed a line of soft kisses along his chest, letting him think he had soothed her unwarranted grief.

It’s a pain that will fade eventually, she tells herself. It has to. Compartmentalization is all but a survival skill with the Doctor, on par with running for their lives and finding the comfiest cuddle-spot in a prison cell when the running doesn’t pan out. But the best she can manage is a dull ache, combated with a swallow of scalding-hot tea to escape her mother’s prying. She feels pathetic for it and shrugs off the Doctor’s concern over her trembling jaw and flushed cheeks - tangible proof of her discomfiture if the irrational concoction of emotion she must be mentally bombarding him with weren’t enough already - as they skid to a halt in the TARDIS medbay and he cups her chin in one long-fingered hand to ask again if she is the alright one. As if it were perfectly alright not to be.

Not when he has his own nightmares (and daymares) over the loss of a planet’s worth of people. Not when their daughter's death is only the freshest in a long line and he doesn’t need any more reminders. Not when _their_ daughter is really _his_ daughter, sprouted from his single, Gallifreyan cell, whatever she may have called Rose on the spur of the moment.

She smiles at him and squeezes his hand, says “I’ll be fine, Doctor,” and turns from him to rifle through the drawer behind her for the universal germ-killing antibiotics that he was babbling about a minute ago. He doesn’t push, nor does she ask for an explanation when he lingers minutes over every freckle when he makes love to her that night, a frustratingly slow form of foreplay but an unspoken comfort all the same in lieu of the words she won’t allow him.

In this case, seeing is believing. It is a perfectly normal trip through the time vortex on a perfectly normal Saturday. Rose is microwaving popcorn with sonic screwdriver setting 1603C for their evening of R&R before meeting her mum in the morning for a perfectly normal Sunday dinner when a sudden shudder of the ship sends the kernels flying everywhere and Rose falling to the floor. She hears the Doctor calling her name moments later, the flip-flop of his Converse flying down the hall, the brush of his long fingers along her vest top and pajama shorts as he gives her a once-over.

_You’re alright?_

“Fine. What _was_ that?”

_Dunno._

“It couldn’t be Jack again, could it?”

_Only if he had a nuclear blast behind him._ The Doctor casts the coral-lit corridor a dark look, his hand moving from her hip to wind around her waist, angling himself to be slightly in front of her.

“I’m fine, yeah?” Well-used to the protective gesture, Rose takes that hand in hers, running her thumb across his knuckles in steady strokes. “C’mon, let’s go see--”

Cut off by the groan of the TARDIS door, they are barely given the chance to exchange apprehensive expressions and mystified remarks before the intruder identifies themselves, an uncertain _hello_ , in a voice that can’t be real, must be distorted by the ship’s amplification of it or else some mind-reading, voice-replicating breed of alien invader has boarded them and wants to gain their trust. In retrospect, it is obviously all the TARDIS’s doing; she can be as big of a ham as her pilot and undoubtedly makes that impossible voice echo so that they can hear it reverberating through the halls, combining with the content hum of the TARDIS in perfect sync, calling _anyone_ _home_ and _Dad_ and _Mum_ and feeling more real, more possible, with every step.

Just as much a sucker for a happy ending and eager for their reunion to unfold, the TARDIS halves the distance between the kitchen and the console room and the Doctor pulls Rose around a not-there-a-second-ago corner only to barrel into the woman waiting just around the other side.

She is beautiful. Her eyes are shadowed, testament to too long without sleep - days, even weeks, if she’s inherited her father’s nocturnal tendencies. Her blonde hair is plastered to her cheeks and forehead with what looks like a combination of grape jelly and cat sick but Rose is willing to bet isn’t, and her leather jacket is caked in the same. When she grabs a coral strut to steady herself, the sleeve of it rides up, revealing a thick, glaring red mark that encircles her wrist; the Doctor frowns - he’s seen it too, and Rose wonders if he is about to whisk them all off to the medbay.

But here she is. Here is Jenny. Here is their daughter, exhausted and dirty and triumphant, every bit the daughter of the Doctor and Rose Tyler and what takes precedence right now is a hug. Even as she angles her head to avoid a faceful of the purplish-brown goo, Rose can’t help but agree and squelches her disappointment when she regains breathing space and the Doctor pins Jenny with his sharp gaze.

_What happened?_

Jenny’s eyes shoot from her parents to the floor. As if on reflex, she reaches for her right ear, nibbles at her lower lip. Acting on instinct, Rose steps between them.

“Doctor, let her take a shower first. She’s covered in . . .”

“Swamp stuff,” says Jenny.

“Swamp stuff,” says Rose. “She’s exhausted. She’s probably starving. We can talk in the morning. You can use my shower,” she adds to Jenny.

A bit taken aback, Jenny nods and, in much the same state of disbelief, Rose shepherds her to the ensuite. She cleans up the scattered popcorn kernels and inserts a cheesy sitcom into the player, complete with laugh-track. The Doctor makes banana pancakes. Things aren’t just the elastic definition of normalcy - they’re _easy_.

It is these few hours Rose looks back on when they aren’t.

On days when the Doctor is not so easily placated, refusing to leave the time vortex till both his passengers give their word that they will stay in the TARDIS till he has determined there is no possibility of danger and Rose and Jenny enlist the old girl’s help in hijacking the controls. Irrationally protective at the best of times, these tendencies have been magnified tenfold since their family’s reunion.

On days when there is a close shave or a twisted ankle, validating the Doctor’s concerns and sending him into fits of self-flagellation or paternal scolding. Jenny can give as good as she gets and Rose is only forced to interpose when things get truly nasty. When Jenny throws herself into danger for no other reason than the thrill of a good run, when her only escape strategy is sheer improvisation. Above all, when she wanders off.

_Rule one!_ What _is rule one?_

“I know what it _is_ , Dad.”

_And it is so bloody hard to follow - why, exactly?_

“Dad--”

_Don’t you_ Dad _me._ Rose clamps down on the inside of her cheek to suppress a smile. Hard to believe she could ever have been shocked by the idea of the Doctor being a father. _What were you thinking? Of all the headstrong, shortsighted, defiant - you know, you get this all from your mother . . ._

“Oh, thanks very much.”

_And you,_ the Doctor rounds on Rose at her retort, _you were supposed to keep an eye on her!_

“When I was handcuffed to _you_?”

“I’m not a child!”

_Well, you obviously can’t be trusted to be on your own without pulling these stunts!_

“Stunts?” Jenny gapes at him. “I saved both your arses back there and you know it. I don’t see Mum getting on my back about it.”

“That’s because _Mum_ thinks you are both being morons,” says Rose, wondering when mediation had started meaning referring to herself in the third person. She turns to the Doctor first; his hair is standing up in all directions from where he has run frustrated fingers through it and his face is pale and drawn, not a sign of anger but one of overwhelming terror. “Doctor - we’re here, we’re fine. We wouldn’t be if it weren’t for Jenny.”

And, at Jenny’s smirk, “We _have_ gotten out of tighter scrapes than that before, though, and you know it. You have to trust that your dad and I know what we’re doing most of the time.”

_Most of the time?_ The Doctor arches a skeptical brow that is supposed to distract from his pouty lower lip.

“Twelve months,” says Rose. Slowly, the Doctor’s jaw unclenches; slower still, Jenny’s anger-flushed face regains its normal hue. Still Rose repeats it for old time’s sake, “Twelve _months_.”

Then there are the days when Rose is the one shouting, her single heart pulsing at the base of her throat, almost up and out of a mouth that works of its own volition, all the while marveling at her mum’s fortitude for not holding her hostage in the flat after that first, mesmerizing date with Jimmy Stone.

_It could’ve been worse._ Left the unlikely voice of reason once the shouting has stopped - Jenny having stormed off to her own shuttle for the next few days and Rose slamming open dresser drawers to throw in wrinkled trousers and tops that litter the floor of their bedroom till she slams her pinkie in one - the Doctor leads Rose to sit next to him on the bed.

“He put her in _danger_.”

_She figured it out. Thinks on her feet, our girl does._ The Doctor nuzzles her cheek. _Just like her mum._

“That doesn’t change the fact that he knew what was coming,” says Rose, unresponsive to the Doctor’s flattery. “They both did. _You_ told Torchwood we didn’t want to be involved, _I_ told Torchwood we didn’t want to be involved. And what does she do - get involved! All for a bit - of - bloody - flirting.” Each word is punctuated by a punch of the pillow with her uninjured hand till she sinks headfirst into the plushness of it instead.

“I swear, if Jack weren’t immortal, I’d kill him.” She’s sure the Doctor is tired of hearing this idle threat, repeated for the umpteenth time, but can feel his hand in her hair all the same, stroking flyaway strands away from her flushed face.

_It does cause him some discomfort. If you’d like, we can arrange something. Shot to the gut might make everyone feel better._

“Shut up. You hate guns.”

_But I love you._

Rose sits up. “How can you be so calm about all this? You used to hate all my pretty boys. Especially Jack.”

_I never_ hated _Jack. I was just a bit . . . territorial._

“Territorial.”

_Not the most mature response, I grant you. Guess you brought out the worst in me, Rose Tyler._ He winks, stretching out the last syllable the way he knows she likes.

“Right. And you don’t feel a bit of that for Jenny.” Pulling her hand from the Doctor’s, Rose crosses her arms across her chest, eyes narrowed. “A protective instinct, or whatever. You know, to make sure she doesn’t throw her life away on some guy, doesn’t let him screw up her chance at a future.”

_Rose, of_ course _I do._

“Sure doesn’t seem like it. ‘Cause when you think about it she was only born a couple of years ago. ‘S not like she has a ton of experience in stuff like this and Jack . . . does and--”

_Would never do anything against anyone’s will,_ says the Doctor. Fast as tearing off a bandaid, he adds, _Nor is he Jimmy Stone._

Rose nods, almost imperceptibly, to the bedspread.

_Alright?_

“Yeah.” Still, she swipes at her lashes to which a few tears hang, leaning gratefully into the hand that cups her cheek. “‘M sorry, I just . . .”

I know. The hand on her cheek guides her to lay it against the fabric of his suit jacket, half-unbuttoned. His hearts are pounding, fast and frantic as after their first and last day with Jenny. Rose expects him to stay silent, waiting, to wheedle anxieties and uncertainties out of her and to lay to rest his own by banishing these. Instead, he speaks - not a torrent of gibberish but slowly and carefully, as though each syllable held the weight of the universe behind it.

_I’ve messed it up so many times, Rose._ He shakes his head, swallows hard, says in a small voice that she hardly ever hears, _I’m terrified._

“So am I.” Her own voice a whisper, Rose wraps her arms around his waist, anchoring him to this life they have made together. All started by a nineteen-year-old shopgirl saying _yes_ because there was a gleam in the human-looking alien’s (or alien-seeming human’s) bright-blue eyes when he offered to be her guide through time and space. Maybe not the best decision, but it was Rose Tyler’s decision and her universe expanded, more than she had ever dreamed possible, to contain it and everything that came after. Mistakes and triumphs and everything in between, none made less for what might have come before with so many still waiting around unexpected corners.

“We’ll get it right,” she says.


	30. License to Kill

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit of a smutty/cracky chapter this time around, though nothing too explicit. No plot whatsoever but that's par for the course with me. :)
> 
> There is also a bit of light BDSM, mostly involving tying each other up, but it is consensual; if this makes you uncomfortable, feel free to give this one a pass.

The Doctor adjusts the black bowtie around his neck, smooths down the shoulders of his tuxedo jacket, clean of all cobwebs since last he wore it. One last, smoldering glance in the mirror and he pushes through the door to his chambers.

His hostage is cuffed to the headboard. Neck twisted at an uncomfortable angle so as to follow his every move, she glares at him, teeth bared like the Wolf she can become. Not so bad now. Now, she is only his Rose.

“Are you ready to talk?”

 _Never._ He can’t say he’s surprised.

The Doctor stalks closer to the bed. Stripped to her corset and stockings, blonde hair splayed across the pillow, she paints quite the picture and he takes a second - several seconds - to drink it all in.

Rose’s thighs rub together as she makes a bid for escape, wrists tugging at the immovable wooden slats; she bites her lip to suppress a moan at the much-needed friction. As if her silence would ensure his ignorance to her arousal. He could smell her from the ensuite. Again, not surprising. He _is_ a very handsome man.

“I admire your tenacity, but it will do you no good with me. I have perfected the art of information-procurement to a science, Rose Tyler.”

 _Must be why they call you the Doctor,_ she says, tone and expression both conveying nothing but the greatest indifference. The same that has toppled, or at least distracted, on countless dictators and megalomaniacs, and the Doctor makes a mental note to compliment her on it later.

“Oh, yes.” He settles for skating a hand up one nylon-bound thigh, pausing at the start of the silky expanse of skin between her hip and navel. She shivers under his feather-light touch before jolting back to herself.

_I’ll never talk._

“Very well.” The Doctor feigns a sigh, climbing atop the bed, straddling her. “I can see I will be forced to resort to more . . . drastic methods.”

Again she bucks up against her bindings, no attempt made to hold back her moan.

 _Do your worst._ Under hooded lids, her eyes still flash in challenge and he knows she is getting impatient. They’ve set the scene - time to get to the good part.

He wants to. God, does he want to. The Doctor growls low and deep in his throat, lowering his lips to her neck, trailing a line of nips and kisses down, down, down to where her breasts heave against the confines of the red-and-gold corset.

She just looks so - so _uncomfortable_ , trussed up like this. Trussed up at her own request, but still . . .

_Slitheen?_

Their safe word, and the Doctor is hovering at her head in an instant, clumsy fingers working at the knots that he just _knew_ he’d tied too blasted tight. Best as she can from her supine position, Rose shakes her head, jerks her hands infinitesimally away from him. There is no pained grimace or look of fear on her face, only concern.

 _No, that’s not . . . Doctor, are_ you _alright? Do you need - ‘cause we can stop if you want . . ._

“ _You_ don’t want to stop, do you?”

_No, but--_

“And I’m not hurting you?” All playfulness gone, he fixes her with a serious stare.

Rose shakes her head again. _No, ‘s brilliant, actually._ Her tongue flicks out of the corner of her mouth, brushing along her lower lip before retreating. _You’re really--_

He cuts her off with a searing kiss, the rest of the sentence undone with the smirk that stretches across his lips as he pulls back, sucking at her bottom lip. He never could resist that smile.

“That’s good,” he says. “Discomfort won’t do when I plan to torture you so thoroughly already.”

 _Torture? Is_ that _what you were planning on?_ The unshakable captive once more, Rose laughs. _All I’ve heard so far are idle threats._

In one move, he tears off her corset - specially supplied by the TARDIS for the occasion - laying those gorgeous breasts bare to his consuming gaze. He tweaks one of her nipples between forefinger and thumb.

“I am a man of action, Rose Tyler. When I pause, it is only to contemplate the best way to break you. My hand,” another pinch, this time of her neglected nipple, “my mouth,” a trail of kisses to where she needs him most, is all but dripping for him, “my cock?”

They blink at each other, mildly surprised at this unexpected bit of vulgarity. Dirty talk is a post usually left to Rose while the Doctor murmurs sweet nothings and odes of adoration against every spare bit of skin. But as he rubs himself against her, demonstrating just what he means by this last term, Rose arching against him, he finds himself warming to it. It is with difficulty that he doesn’t scramble from the bed, tearing loose buttons and laces in the heat of passion, but slowly shimmies out of his trousers and pinstriped pants, flings the pristine coat over the canopy rod, undoes his shirt button by button, all without garroting himself with the bowtie Rose insisted on.

His own exercise in control. A prize-winning performance on most planets, he is sure, especially when she smiles again with just that touch of tongue.

“All three, I think.” Rejoining her on the bed, he plunges two fingers inside her. She gasps at the sudden, too-brief relief before she needs _more_ , needs him to _move_. He’s calculated the exact angle too many times to count, the one that will send her spiraling. Now, he stops just short of it.

“How long can I keep you on edge? How long before you beg me for it?” He curls his fingers, just a bit further in, a few degrees short of ecstasy.

 _Mngh, nev- mmm . . ._ Rose squirms underneath him, a transparent try for more pressure. He pins her hips with his own until she stills, caressing her ribs in a light tickle, questionable reward.

“You know, in the sixteenth century, people would call an orgasm _la petite mort_? In English, it means _little death_ ,” he says, when all Rose does is stare at him, not in the mood to, or incapable of, forming a witty reply.

“I just find it _fascinating_ , don’t you?” Faster the Doctor pumps his fingers, Rose’s slick walls tightening around him. “Likening sexual release to freedom from this mortal coil? Brilliant. Although-”

_Doc - don’t . . . don’ sto-_

He does stop and she cries out, would have pummeled him with her fists if not restrained so. Not sorry in the slightest, he pulls his fingers free and licks them clean before leaning down to stroke back a few sweaty strands of hair, to kiss her cheek and brush a whisper across the shell of her ear.

“- it must make what comes before that release utterly . . . _torturous_ , wouldn’t you say?”

Her breath comes in spurts, tiny gasps and needy sounds that ruffle the hairs at the nape of his neck. Her lips purse against the answer he requires, the words that need to come as badly as she does.

“Tell me, Rose.” He doesn’t bother with her surname this time. “Tell me and this can all be over.” He kisses her hard, lets her taste her own desperation on the lips that she now catches between her teeth in a shaky show of defiance. He’s tasted her already, too briefly, on his fingers, is already craving more.

So he does. Nips at the sensitive spot behind her ear, sucks her nipples till they stand, pink and pointy, at attention, marks a wet trail from her sternum to bellybutton, brushes feather-light kisses and his scratchy two-day stubble across her inner thighs - an achingly slow descent. Finally, blessedly, closing over her mass of soft brown curls, doing all of these and more. Briefly, he considers freeing her hands if only for the pleasure of having them tangle in his hair but a peek up at Rose shows her stretched taut as a bowstring, gorgeous in her unchecked desperation.

He files a second mental note to congratulate her on what a brilliant idea this was. For now, he eases her another femtometer closer to the edge.

“I could do this all day, Rose Tyler.” He presses a kiss to her swollen bud, letting his tongue rest before resuming its work, swirling and twirling at the brink. “Alll dayyyy.”

_Please . . ._

“What is it, Rose?” It’s a whimper, barely audible, but it is enough to make the Doctor pause in his delectable torture. He crawls his way back up her body, aligning them from stem to stern. “Tell me.”

_Please . . . let me - let me come._

“Well, yes, I assumed that much.”

_Pleaaase._

He almost gives in. It’s an arresting sight, Rose Tyler begging him for something that he isn’t compelled to give by a tongue-tipped smile or doe-eyed blink, and there are frustrated tears welling in her eyes now. Despite it all, they are still playing. She hasn’t said _Slitheen_ since they began, nor has he. It’s a game that she can end at any time but chooses not to because that would leave them at a draw and Rose Tyler plays to win.

And even if she loses, gives in to him, she will still get her release. Now, it is just a matter of her pride.

He says no. “No, Rose.” He ruts against her, letting his own groan go unsuppressed. “You know what I need to hear.” He lets the tip of his cock rest at her entrance, wanting nothing more than to sheath himself fully in her. “Do you want me to start you off? _The Doctor_ . . .”

Rose gulps. _The Doctor - the Doctor is the--_

“Almost there, love.”

_\-- the greatest lover the universe has ever known - please, pleassse . . ._

“And?” The Doctor arches an eyebrow, a reminder to Rose that there is still more of her confession to come, an order to himself not to move, not to dare move.

Slicked in sweat, seconds away from orgasm, Rose still manages an exasperated eyeroll. _Oh, come on, are you really that . . ._

“Allll dayyyy, Rose.”

 _And is far, far more roguishly handsome than Timothy Daltonnnn._ Unable to contain himself any longer, the Doctor thrusts into her at the beginning of the last syllable, the _ton_ sound turning into a gasp, a groan, a cry that he catches in an open-mouthed kiss before releasing her to hear his name shouted, over and over, from mouth and mind both. The Doctor is quick to reciprocate.

“Rose, Rose, my Rose . . .”

_Beautiful. Gorgeous. Sexiest thing in the universe. Rose, Rose, Roseeee._

Telepathically, he is hardly more coherent, fully focused on the movement of his body in sync with Rose Tyler’s, how it was always meant to be. On how tightly her legs are wrapped around him and how her fingers twist in the ropes till he tears them loose, discipline vanished, and she rakes them up and down his back and scalp instead. On how she throws her head back as she comes, shouting his name to their skylight of stars, and the glimpse of satisfaction in her eyes when this urges him to follow. His forearms quiver with the effort of holding himself over her and is only prevented from collapsing by Rose’s hands at his shoulders, easing him down from his high, onto the mattress at her side.

“Twenty-two minutes,” he says, once he can wrap his tongue around polysyllables again, “eleven seconds, thirty-six - sorry, thirty-seven milliseconds. Not bad, Rose Tyler.”

 _Eight minutes._ She snuggles into his chest with a sigh, and the Doctor tucks the blankets up around them. _I could’ve lasted eight more minutes._

“Welll, seven minutes, forty-nine seconds, and twenty-three milliseconds. Really, Rose, you're selling yourself short.” He lifts one of her wrists to eye-level, turning it over in search of any marks, before kissing her palm and doing the same with the other. “After all, I _am_ the greatest lover the universe has ever known.”

Entirely drained, Rose’s jab to his ribs turns into more of a halfhearted nudge but doesn’t give her threat any less weight. _Just wait till tomorrow, Time Lord. Then it’s_ your _turn._

“Can’t wait.”


	31. License to Drive

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back to where it all started with some Nine/Rose this time

Rose had never passed her driving test; along with her A-levels, driver’s-ed was left in the dust of Jimmy Stone’s clunker car. Even after  _that_ had gone up in smoke, she hadn’t gone back, London was more suited to cabs and tube rides than a car she couldn’t afford anyway.

Then came the TARDIS where the Doctor was happy to act as her personal chauffeur, shuttling them around to see the end of the world and meet Charles Dickens, even a little shopping if she asked nicely and widened her eyes just a bit. In between trips, when Rose was asleep or didn’t feel like doing much of anything, the Doctor would slip underneath the console, armed with his sonic screwdriver and a new piece or part that he’d haggled over at the last marketplace they’d stopped in.

“What’s that one do?”

The Doctor angled his head to peer up at her. “What’s that?”

“What’re you installing?” asked Rose. She wiggled her big toe in the direction of the device he was holding, it resembled an inside-out umbrella.

“Oh . . . uhm--”

“You’re not just _spending money for the sake of it_ , are you?” Rose imitated his Northern accent, a laugh in her voice. “‘Cause you’re always after me for doing that.”

“Just don’t want to bore you.”

“If I was bored, I wouldn’t have asked. I never know what you’re doing down there, ‘s interesting.”

“Oh.” He sounded surprised but recovered quickly, scooting out from underneath the console to take her hand. “Come on under, Rose Tyler. You’re going to get a proper tour of the TARDIS.”

Where several months ago Rose had learned how to mentally reconfigure the ship’s map in her head every time the rooms were rearranged and how to sweet-talk the TARDIS into helping her locate the Doctor after they’d had a spat, now the Doctor taught her what kept the translation circuit going, which combination of buttons and levers would send them into the vortex, and a slightly different combination of buttons and levers that could dash them to smithereens. Rose took this last with a grain of salt; she had seen the Doctor haggle for hours over parts that appeared to do nothing but look cool. This, she assumed, was the case with the inside-out umbrella thing, despite the Doctor’s claims to the contrary. Boys and their toys.

“‘Scuse me for wanting to keep you in one piece, Rose Tyler,” he groused during next week’s lesson.

“Whatever you say,” Rose teased, tongue between her teeth in concentration. “I’d press . . .  _this_ one, right?”

“That’s right.” The Doctor nodded. “And next?”

Rose’s right hand skirted tentatively across the console. “Erm . . .” She turned to the Doctor, studying his face for a clue. “Can I ask the audience?”

“You know this one, Rose.”

“That one!” Rose pointed at a yellow button, pumping her fist in triumph when the Doctor grinned, picking her up and laughing with the same level of glee as when she’d correctly pronounced _Raxacoricofallapatorius_.

It was driver’s-ed but it was better than that. Except for Marty McFly’s DeLorean, Rose didn’t know of any cars that could travel through time, nor was the Doctor your typical instructor. In Rose’s experience, driving teachers were supposed to be balding with a voice like one of the adults from Charlie Brown, constantly consulting a clipboard or textbook. As far as she knew, the Doctor had no such manual but taught her off the cuff. Whether it was installing whatever he had bought that day or a trip home to see her mum, the coordinates familiar to Rose by now, he would tell her step-by-step what he was doing and ask her to recreate it once they were safely stationed in the vortex or on the pavement of the Powell Estate.

The only problem was that was _all_ he would let her do.

“What if something happens to you?” asked Rose, frustrated.

“There’s an emergency programme,” said the Doctor. “I wouldn’t leave you stranded somewhere, Rose.”

“No, I know that. But I thought the whole point of this was so that I could _help_ if something went wrong. I don’t want to just be in the way.”

The Doctor frowned. “You aren’t _in the way_ , Rose. You’re a vital part of the operation. While I’m stuck on the big picture, you’re noticing the little things that no one but you would notice.” He grinned, bright blue eyes hopeful for her to accept the compliment, and the distraction. “Remember Gwyneth? And that Dalek? You made a Dalek _feel_ something, Rose. Not a lot of people who can do that.”

If the Doctor was bringing up Daleks, then he really wanted to change the subject. Rose didn’t let him. They’d been traveling together for months now but she still felt like the wide-eyed girl on his arm, fading uselessly into the background when real danger struck, collateral instead of an equal.

“Please, Doctor? Just one flight?”

One run, back into the vortex or to one of their favorite planets, and she could prove to the Doctor - prove to them both - that she didn’t need to be kept out of trouble and when it did find them, she was more than capable of pulling them out of it in one piece.

“This isn’t like driving a car, Rose.”

No, thought Rose. It was better.

“I know what I’m doing.”

“You understand the _concept_ of what you’re doing,” the Doctor corrected. “Putting it into action is something else. There’s a lot more at stake here than a fender-bender.”

“Just one,” she said, holding up a finger. “A test. If I do anything wrong, I won’t bring it up again.” He still looked reluctant and she flicked her gaze down to the grating then, slowly, back up to the Doctor. “Please? I’m not trying to . . . I just want to help.”

“Once,” he agreed on a sigh, bringing her in for a hug nonetheless. “But I choose when. And where. And if I say stop, you _stop_. I’ll take over. No questions asked, understood?”

Rose nodded into his shoulder, beaming. This was going to be _fantastic_.

**.   .   .**

“You alright?”

“Fine.” Rose readjusts the cold compress on her swollen ankle, closing her eyes against the penlight the Doctor shines into them, checking for signs of concussion.

“I’d like to go to my room now,” she announces, uncrossing her legs and placing them gingerly on the cold floor of the medbay. Difficult to balance on one twisted ankle but not impossible if it meant she got to escape the Doctor’s tense jaw that bites back a vindicated _I told you so_. Better for them both in the long run: she’d get a chance to cool off and he wouldn’t get a slap.

No matter how much he deserves it. She’d been doing _fine_ , maybe not brilliantly but good for someone with no Time Lord genes to fall back on. The Doctor had been circling the console, hands stuffed in his pockets to keep from interfering. The most he would do was clear his throat and Rose would correct herself. She’d even seen him crack a smile, then there was the _bump_. Nothing major, hardly more than a speed bump. It barely fazed her - they’d encountered worse when the Doctor was at the helm - and Rose quickly regained her balance, ignoring his shout of protest.

That was when the second bump hit, this time in the form of the Doctor, sending her skidding across the grating, into one of the coral struts and her current predicament.

“Can you walk?” asks the Doctor.

“What does it look like I’m doing?”

“Hobbling.” He offers the crook of his arm for her to lean on. Rose just stares at it. “It’ll make me feel better.”

“Not really my priority at the moment.” Rose strides past him, towards the medbay’s double doors. _Striding_ , not hobbling.

The Doctor keeps pace with her easily. “Rose . . .”

“I’ll just have the TARDIS move my room closer.” Within a few weeks of her arrival, she and the ship had developed a system; if the Doctor could hide from her when he was in a mood, then Rose was entitled to the same.

“I can--”

“ _I_ can do it.” She spins to face him, biting her lip at the jolt of pain that shoots up her leg. “I’ve fallen loads of times from your crappy driving, I’ll be fine in the morning. Stop fussing already.”

“Alright.” The Doctor runs his hands over one another, ridding them of imaginary dust. “Fussing over, if that’s what you want to call it. Me, I just call it a friend offering a hand, doesn’t happen often.” Shoulders hunched under his leather jacket, he brushes past her to hold open one of the doors. “Night, then.”

“Night,” Rose shoulders past him, congratulating her feet on staying steady. “Have fun at your pity party.”

The Doctor snorts. “Stove, meet kettle.”

“Pot,” Rose corrects automatically before adding, bristling, “What’s that s’posed to mean?”

“You’re martyring yourself for getting a bit banged-up. I was just trying to help you feel better.”

“Is that what you think? That I’m upset ‘cause I got hurt?” Rose forces a laugh. “You daftie, I’m upset because you didn’t trust me _not_ to get hurt. We were going fine till you knocked me out of the way.”

“There was turbulence.”

“Well, couldn’t you have _told_ me that? Maybe I could’ve _helped_. That’s all I want to do, Doctor, that’s what I keep _saying_ , and you’re not giving me the . . .”

“And _I_ said,” the Doctor growls, “to stop when I said stop. You didn’t. End of discussion.”

“But--”

“Weren’t you going to your room?” Rose can feel her cheeks warm. He’s scolding her like she’s a naughty child.

Ignoring the way her ankle twinges at every step, Rose moves to block his path. “So, what? I’m supposed to hang on your arm and go faint at any sign of danger? Any . . . .’turbulence’?” She fakes a gasp, holding a hand to her breast.

“No,” says the Doctor, “but you _are_ supposed to listen to me. This isn’t a joke. In the TARDIS, it might be just us. Out there . . . there’s dangers you’ve never dreamed of, Rose.”

“Wonders, too.”

He shrugs, barely conceding her point. “‘Course. Point is, I’d like you around to see them.”

“I will be.”

“Not at this rate. You notice the little things and run right into the danger that’s lurking behind them. If I say _stay here_ , you head in the opposite direction, if I say _run_ , you’re stuck to me like glue. If I say _stop_. . .” He hangs his head, deep lines carved between his brows; Rose reaches out to trace them with the pad of her thumb.

“I’m sorry, Doctor . . . I can’t.”

She expects the Doctor to yell at her again or to stalk off, remanding himself to his own room. The last thing she expects is for him to smile, thin and close-lipped but still a smile. “I know.”

“We’ll be OK.” Rose slides her fingers from the Doctor’s temple to cup his cheek. Gratefully, he leans into her touch. “I promise.”

“It’s going to be more than a bit of turbulence someday, Rose.”

Still, he looks a little less skeptical than before and Rose takes it as an invitation a chance to prove to him that while she may run away, she’ll always come back, will always find a way back to his side because with the Doctor you don’t stop. It’s a breakneck ride down hairpin turns, narrowly avoiding accidents but never colliding, and you don’t notice till a safe stretch that the brakes are cut.

“Then you’d better teach me how to weather it. Same time next week?”

As incapable of stopping as she is, the Doctor agrees.


End file.
